3

The Decline of Europe

The leading states of the European Union, and in particular of the
eurozone, are dogged by a growing sense of decline. But t his is st ill a
confused awareness, as demonst rat ed by t he fact t hat it is t he individual
st at es, t heir product ion syst ems and t heir societ ies t hat are said t o be in
decline, rather than Europe as a whole, and also by the fact that no one
appreciates the historical as opposed to cyclical-economic nature of
Europe s decline, or understands the causes that prompted it in the first
place and t hat are ensuring it s cont inued deepening. But Europe is in
decline, and there is a vague realisation of this fact. The quality of civil
cohabitation in Europe is being damaged by lack of confidence. The
future is perceived as dark and uncertain. The spirit of innovation and of
enterprise and the will to plan are frustrated at every turn.
* * *
This decline concerns, first of all, international politics, and its effects
have emerged with stark clarity in the events surrounding the Balkan
crisis and, more recently, the war in Iraq. In this latter case, the Europeans
have been obliged not only t o wat ch, helpless, t he unfolding of a senseless
war t hat t hey did not even want , but also t o sust ain a considerable share
of t he enormous cost s it has generat ed and cont inues t o generat e.
That Europe no longer carries any weight on the international political
st age, and is subject t o t he hegemony of t he Unit ed St at es, is hardly a new
discovery. It is a reality that became clear at the end of the Second World
War, even t hough t he phenomenon was subsequent ly during t he Cold
War concealed by the threat that the presence of the Soviet Union
represented to both the US and Europe. The fact that the United States
hegemony had a clear rival in the USSR prevented the Europeans from
feeling dominated, and gave them the sensation that they were contribut-
ing to the realisation of a joint project and to the defence of common
values.
This is no longer the case today. Now, the danger lies not in the risk
4
of a possible attack from outside, but in terrorism fed by Islamic fun-
damentalism, whose network extends to the United States and all the
countries of Europe. And American hegemony certainly does nothing to
guarantee European security in the face of this danger. It is a fact that
Europe could play a decisive role in the attempt to eradicate evil at grass
roots level, favouring unity, economic development and the democratic
evolution of the states of North West Africa and the Middle East, with
which it enjoys a posit ive relat ionship charact erised by geographical
proximity and close interdependence. But its impotence prevents it from
playing an effective role in this area, or in any other sensitive world
region. As a result, Europeans are finding, more and more often, that they
serve merely to make up the numbers in the international equilibrium.
Whereas new actors, like China, India and Brazil, are entering the world
political stage, and old actors, like Russia, are making a comeback,
Europe is exit ing t he scene and count ing for less and less in t he st rat egic
calculations both of the only major power that currently exists and of
those that are emerging.
The European governments are perfectly aware of Europe s rapid
international slide, just as they are aware of the need for European foreign
and defence policies. But they believe, or more accurately, they feign to
believe, that this problem can be resolved by strengthening collaboration
between the Union s member states (or between some of them), through
the formation of small multinational task forces or the achievement of a
degree of coordinat ion of arms product ion; and possibly by creat ing
figures who, despit e being ent irely devoid of t he power t o make and
implement decisions in Europe s name, can represent the Union formally
and allow it to speak with a single voice. Clearly, this is not the way to
halt Europe s international decline.
* * *
Equally shocking is economic decline of t he leading eurozone coun-
tries, which are recording, in relation to their GDP, extremely weak, and
sometimes even negative growth. Their unemployment levels are sky
high and t heir product ion syst ems are becoming less and less able t o fend
off the growing competition from eastern Asia. The euro, despite its
apparent strength, has failed to take off as an international currency, and
continues to be conditioned by the trend of the dollar; at the same time,
depreciation of the dollar is cancelling out the balance of payments
surplus of t he count ries belonging t o economic and monet ary union, but
5
in the absence of any compensatory growth of these countries domestic
markets. There exists no European policy to relaunch public spending
in spite of the fact that a growing number of countries have exceeded or
look set to exceed the budget deficit limit imposed by the Stability Pact
and no infrastructure development policy. The number of production
sectors in real difficulty is multiplying, as is the number of financial
crises.
Politicians and observers alike cannot help but note this trend. But
they fail to appreciate the true nature of it. This much is clear from the fake
remedies that are proposed, the first of which consists of overcoming the
so-called rigidity of the labour market and dismantling, at least in part, the
welfare state, which was built on the social achievements that have made
Europe the world region that has accomplished most in the fight for social
justice and better civil cohabitation. And all this in the name of a sort of
social Darwinism whose logic is that of enriching the rich while con-
demning a considerable section of the population to an existence of
insecurity, marginalisation and poverty. The second is to push the
European Central Bank into lowering further the already extremely low
base interest rate, a measure that would create practically no extra room
for manoeuvre, thereby failing to learn from the example of Japan, which,
despit e having almost zero int erest rat es, has nevert heless endured an
extremely protracted period of stagnation.
In reality the causes of Europe s economic decline lie in the incapacity
to act that is a consequence of its division. They are political and in-
stitutional, that is to say, structural causes, not ones linked to economic
t rends. This is not t o deny t hat t he current downward t rend will go t hrough
cyclical phases. But it will not be reversed until Europe s political
weakness has been overcome. It is t his polit ical weakness t hat prevent s
the euro from taking its place alongside the dollar as an international
currency, discourages t he labelling of cont ract s, part icularly oil supply
contracts, in euros, and reduces international investors faith in the
European currency. In this way the euro, and with it the whole of the
eurozone s foreign t rade, submit s passively t o t he consequences of t he
fortunes of the dollar, which appreciates or depreciates according to the
policy of the US government.
The truth is that the European Monetary Union is not backed by a
European power, with a sphere of influence that is dependent on Europe
for its security and development, into which Europe can channel re-
sources, and wit h which it can int ensify t rade, adopt ing t he euro as an
international currency.
6
Obviously, the urgent need for a European power with the capacity to
act is dictated by more than just this need to strengthen the international
role of the euro; it is also linked to the question of internal control of the
currency.
As things stand at the moment, the single currency has been left in the
hands of a technical body, whose only role is to keep inflation in check.
This body urgent ly needs t o be joined by a polit ical body t hat , governing
the real economy and promoting its growth, is in a position to influence
t he value of t he currency. This body must have it s own budget , funded by
direct taxation of the citizens, the size of which will depend not on
difficult agreement s bet ween count ries whose sole concern is t o cont rib-
ut e as lit t le as possible t o t he Union, but inst ead be decided democrat i-
cally at European level. It must be equipped to counter negative economic
trends with a policy that is effective, and not strangled by the obligation
(in reality, often not fulfilled) to adhere to the parameters of a Stability
Pact imposed as a result of t he absurd co-exist ence of a single currency
and a number of sovereign st at es, each wit h responsibilit y for it s own
economic policy. It must have at its disposal the instruments needed to
develop and put int o pract ice a great infrast ruct ural design capable of
relaunching the European economy.
* * *
The economic decline of the eurozone is paralleled by its technologi-
cal inferiority to the United States, especially marked in the sectors of
information networks, space exploration and the biotechnologies, and
increasingly t o China, which has recent ly approved an ambit ious space
programme. It must be underlined that the degree of technological
progress recorded by Europe, t he Unit ed St at es and China, shows, in all
three cases, absolutely no relationship with the size of the respective
count ry s GDP. This is because great t echnological progress can be
achieved only if it is act ively promot ed by t he public powers, and adopt ed
and developed by indust ry only when it has reached a level at which it
allows t he product ion of goods and services for which t here is a pot ent ial
market. This is what happened not only in the obvious case of the space
programmes, but also in that of the Internet, which started out as a military
project, and in that of the biotechnologies, which have evolved thanks to
public funding of research conduct ed in t he laborat ories of universit ies,
research cent res and hospit als. Technology is t hus able t o evolve when
the resources of a large, developed (or developing) market are coordi-
7
nat ed and employed by an applied research policy conceived t o support
a design capable of mobilising t he resources of an ent ire count ry.
It cannot evolve in Europe wit h t he except ion of t he odd success
in the field of space research because in t he t echnological sphere, as
in many others, the European countries have separate, intersecting and
overlapping policies, whose funding is wholly inadequat e. In t rut h, t he
European Union is a bureaucratic and not a political entity, and no one of
its member states, being weak and impotent, is able to recruit the energies
needed to support a great project for the future.
This sit uat ion nat urally has repercussions on t he sphere of basic
research, which represent s t he necessary foundat ion of t echnology.
There is no point dwelling upon the lamentable state of scientific research
in Europe, which is widely known and demonst rat ed by t he mass exodus
of young researchers t o t he Unit ed St at es. All we will say is t hat Europe,
which st ill has a valid secondary school and universit y syst em, pours
money into the education of young scientists, only to lose them to the
Unit ed St at es, whose secondary schools and universit ies, wit h t he odd
exception, are of a far lower standard. The United States is thus able to
profit from the work of foreign-trained scientific personnel from the very
moment these individuals, having represented a cost for the states in
which t hey were schooled, become product ive.
* * *
In fact, the technological and scientific decline of the eurozone is
nothing more than the most obvious manifestation of the process that is
turning its countries into a cultural wasteland. It is true that cultural
decline in it s broadest sense is somet hing t hat is hard t o est ablish, given
that quantitative analysis of it is difficult and qualitative description
inevitably subjective. There can also be no doubt that continental Europe
has great t radit ions, deeply root ed in it s hist ory and cult ural inst it ut ions,
which enjoy not able prest ige, acquired over decades and somet imes
cent uries, and which put s a brake on t his inexorable decline. But it is also
a fact that the arts, architecture, literature, the theatre, music, history,
philosophy, and the social sciences follow the migration of power and
wealth, and that they have now abandoned Europe in favour of the United
States (a phenomenon less marked in the UK, thanks to Britain and
America enjoying a special relationship and sharing the same lan-
guage). It is a fact, too, that the leading cultural institutions in the United
St at es are enjoying a boom not only are they increasing in number,
8
they are also becoming more wealthy and more active , whereas t he
opposite is happening in Europe. On the other side of the Atlantic, there
exists a wealthy public and a vast publishing market that together stimu-
late the creation of culture and feed cultural debate. America s leading
cities, New York in particular, have the irresistible attraction of being the
most important stages of what is the last remaining great global power,
and are t hus t he focus of t he aspirat ions of all t hose seeking success and
renown t hrough t he product ion of cult ure. As all t his is going on, Europe
is becoming increasingly impoverished and moving slowly t owards it s
own curtain-fall.
* * *
At this point, one can hardly be surprised that a mood of demoralisa-
tion, due to the lack of future prospects, is creeping over the citizens of
Europe, that the most talented of Europe s youth is forced either to leave
or t o downsize it s ambit ions in accordance wit h t he widespread medi-
ocrity that prevails within the continent, or that there lack collective
projects with the potential to stimulate as yet unexpressed skills and
resources and t o mobilise energies. Neit her can one be surprised t hat t his
attitude generates a deep lack of faith in a political order that is unable to
halt Europe s downward slide and incapable of involving the citizens in
a great design t hat represent s an import ant st ep forward t owards t he
liberation of mankind.
All this is the progressive decline of politics, politics being a term that,
in Europe, now has nothing to do with the idea of the pursuit of the com-
mon good. Of it s dual nat ure, based on ethos and kratos, all that remains
is t he power st ruggle aspect . And t his, st ripped of t he values t hat ennoble
it, appears merely repulsive. Politics is no longer about things that need
t o be done and object ives t hat must be pursued; inst ead it is degenerat ing
int o a sort of squalid t heat re in which a polit ical class wit hout ideas is
interested only in its own self promotion in the media. European politics
t oday is preoccupied solely wit h image and wit h squabbling, put t ing on
a spectacle for the benefit of a passive public that is incapable of reacting.
Civil societ y, in an advanced indust rial st at e, is wit hout doubt made
up of men and women who are concerned, above all, with their own
private affairs and their own welfare. But when the political climate heats
up, and t he issues are import ant , t he cit izens show t hemselves t o be
sensit ive t o t he appeals and ent reat ies issued by t he polit ical class and by
the most lively and active sections of society, and ready to be drawn into
9
political debate. This is true not only when, like at election times, they are
instruments in the struggle for power, but also in relation to the vicissi-
t udes of everyday polit ics. The opposit e occurs when polit ics is unable t o
come up wit h ideas or develop project s. In t his sit uat ion, any willingness
of t he cit izens t o engage in polit ical debat e is repressed, or degenerat es
int o st erile prot est t hat is devoid of new ideas, or, at best , is channelled
into non political voluntary work. When this happens, there is no point
directing rhetoric at the citizens, and appealing to them to have confi-
dence, unless you also show t hem a vision of a bet t er fut ure and t he pat h
that must be followed in order to attain it. Confidence cannot be built by
delivering proclamat ions and vague incit ement s, but only by proposing
a precise plan t hat , based on clear ideals, has real value and is t hus likely
to induce a great many people to become committed to its realisation.
* * *
It is therefore up to politics to reverse the trend, showing the citizens
a clear and concrete objective that, once more taking the great values of
European civilisation as the ultimate point of reference for political
debat e, gives meaning t o t he lives of all, and inst ils a sense of hope in t he
young. And given that Europe s division is at the root of its decline, then
this objective can only be the unification of the continent. Indeed, there
can be no denying t hat t he waning of public spirit in t he European st at es
has, quit e clearly, gone hand in hand wit h t he weakening of t he ideal of
European unification.
In order to render concrete and visible this project for our continent,
European unificat ion must not be allowed t o remain an ambiguous and
general term; instead, it must be synonymous with a clearly defined point
of destination. Europe can regain a role on the international stage, give its
currency a role comparable with that of the dollar, and give its citizens the
feeling that they are contributing to the decisions determining the
evolution of the process of the liberation of mankind, but only by
becoming a leading act or in world affairs, by conduct ing a foreign policy
t hat serves t he values of peace, collaborat ion and development , and by
rendering this policy credible through its control of an army that is
answerable to a democratic power. It can inject new life into its economy,
but only if it has it s own budget and t he power t o fund t his budget t hrough
taxation, rather than depending on the goodwill of the Union s member
st at es. In t his way, it will be able t o develop and carry t hrough a great plan
for internal and international economic development and an ambitious
policy for technological advancement, which will render its production
10
system once more competitive and foster a spirit of enterprise, without
jeopardising the great achievements of the welfare state. In this way, it
will regain t he st imuli and t he resources needed t o get back t o t he cut t ing
edge of scient ific research and t o become, once again, t he world s leading
centre of artistic creation and cultural debate.
But to give a European government exclusive control of an army, that
is, a monopoly on physical force, and to enable it to have at its disposal
a budget of its own and the power of taxation, in other words, to give
Europe the instruments of the sword and t he purse, means to attribute it
with sovereign powers. In short, to establish, in Europe, a federal state,
beginning within the limited sphere in which this project is truly feasible,
and ending with a great entity that embraces the territory of the entire
European Union, whatever its configuration. Today, in Europe, the state
exists only in the historically superseded national framework, that is, in
a dimension that does not allow the development of great projects or the
t aking of great decisions, and t hat t hus belit t les t he aspirat ions of it s
citizens and saps their energy; meanwhile, the dimension in which all this
would be possible is filled wit h bureaucrat ic inst it ut ions, whose deci-
sions, whenever t hey are arrived at , are expressions of slow and laborious
compromises reached between the governments of numerous (formerly
fifteen, now twenty-five) sovereign states, and not the result of demo-
cratic debate among the citizens of Europe and the parties that represent
them.
The founding of a federal state in Europe is an enormously difficult
objective. Like all the historical objectives that have required a radical
transformation of the power order, it may even seem impossible. What is
beyond doubt is t hat it cannot be achieved t hrough t echnical fudging of
the issues, which serves only to mask the reality, that is the nation-states
continued preservation of their sovereignty.
In truth, no alliance, no confederation or customs union, no complex
institutional construct even one that goes by the name of constitution
can get round the fact that sovereignty is either left in the hands of the
nation-states or transferred to Europe: and that this transfer can come
about only if Europe becomes a state, even one based initially on a re-
stricted group of countries set within a geographically expanding frame-
work.
This is the only course that will not only enable Europe to face up to
the great problems of international collaboration, security and economic
growth, but also make politics once more synonymous with commitment
to the common good, and thus the most noble of human activities. Only
11
a st at e wit h a decisive role in t he global equilibrium can devise and pursue
a great design internal or international that gives citizenship the
value of being involved in t he promot ing of peace and t he building of an
open, innovat ive and solid societ y, and by so doing gat her consensus and
mobilise energies.
This is why, today, the difficult battle to found a European federal
state is the only one worth fighting.
The Federalist
12
The Saga of the European
Federalists During and After
the Second World War
JEAN-PIERRE GOUZY
I. The 1920s and 1930s
After the First World War, during the 1920s, a European current of
thought arose from the inability of organising the European states and
people according to an international natural order suited to the unity and
diversity of Europe.
In the 1930s an original federalist orientation developed in response
to the inability to establish a society that could meet the needs of the
Twentieth Century and safeguard Europeans from the proletarian and
totalitarian scourges. This new movement was inspired, particularly in
France, by the Proudhonian and libertarian traditions of the labour
movement and personalist thought. The Italian Francesco Nitti was well
aware that Clemenceau s peace with Wilson s methods was the worst
imaginable. Another Italian, the liberal Luigi Einaudi, who later became
President of the Republic after the fall of Fascism, had already criticised
the League of Nations and its projects back in 1918. His arguments were
strangely similar to those used later in 1935 by Lord Lothian. The latter s
work on pacifism tackled, in the face of increasing dangers, the failure of
the Geneva enterprise.
The European idealism of the 1920s and 1930s was notably marked
by an extraordinary character, Count Richard Coudenove-Kalergi, a
brilliant cosmopolitan aristocrat who founded the Pan-European move-
ment in Vienna in 1923. Some of the most distinguished personalities of
the political and literary world during the Roaring Twenties joined his
efforts. Among them: Edouard Herriot, Lon Blum, Eleuthatios Venizelos,
Paul Claudel, Paul Valry, Miguel de Unanumo, Edouard Bns, Francesco
13
Nitti.
Aristide Briand s assertion, made in Geneva on the 5
th
of September
1929 in the name of the French government, may be seen as the height of
europeist verbalism of t his era. During a sensat ional speech he urged
Europeans to develop a sort of federal bond... without interfering with
the sovereignty of any nation that may form a part of such an association.
Alexis Lger, the then general secretary of the Quai d Orsay, better
known as one of the greatest contemporary poets under the name of Saint-
John Perse, wrote a memorandum on the organisation of a Federal
European Union regime, presented to the League of Nations. However,
since 1931 the proposition became bogged down in the procedure. Else-
where, Nazism was making meteoric progress in Germany, resulting in
Adolph Hitler coming to power on the 20
th
of January 1933, whilst the
consequences of the Wall Street Crash on the 24
th
of October 1929
quest ioned t he cert aint ies upon which our bourgeois and liberal societ y
had unt il t hat point been based.
In France, equally, t his same decade was t he junct ure of t he first t ruly
global federalist awareness prior to the Second World War. By this I
am referring obviously to the Ordre Nouveau movement, steeped in
Personalist Philosophy, wit h Arnaud Dandieu, Denis de Rougemont ,
Alexandre Marc; a whole generat ion haunt ed by t he idea of a crisis of
civilisation, worried about the ensuing war. Certainly, Ordre Nouveau
called for a new Europe, but it also required federalism within the
economic and social relations. The group s opposition was global, it was
closely akin to the thoughts of the early resistants to Hitlerism in
Germany, like Harro Schulze-Boysen, in Great Britain, to the worries of
the New Britain movement organisers, etc..
Was it still possible to remake Europe in the early part of the
decisive decade t hat was t he 1930s? The young int ellect uals of Ordre
Nouveau in vain took on the false democracies as well as their totalitarian
offshoots. They declared that Paneuropa and the League of Nations
were nothing but different expression of the same idealist pipe dream.
Their protest is a valuable testimony, despite not being able to stop the
inescapable course of events. It was the European regime that, in fact,
found it self brut ally called int o quest ion by t he disast rous collapse of t he
international order established by the Treaty of Versailles,
1
of Trianon
2
and of Saint Germain
3
, during 1919/1920, first in March 1938 by the
Anschluss and later the Sudtes affair, and in the same year the Dantzig
corridor affair, which lead to the Second World War in September 1939.
14
II. From War to Post-War
What was t he profound significance of t he monst rous event s t hat
marked the Second World War and caused the death of 38 million
civilians and soldiers?
This significance, in our sense, is t he t riumph over t he carcasses of
dictators representing the totalitarian Nazi and fascist ideologies, of two
dominant ideologies totally opposing one another in terms of their
notions of man and society, but who tried to unite in order to rule the world
and at the same time divide it in two different zones of influence.
St alin symbolised t he first and Roosevelt t he second, because he was
convinced, as Wilson before him, on the subject of the League of Nations,
that by placing the universe under the control of that peaceful organisa-
tion, the United Nations, the relationship with the communist world
could once again be amicable. At the Teheran conference in December
1943, it was agreed that Germany ought to be dismembered. In Yalta in
January 1945, Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin devised the plan to build
a new world societ y, according t o t he aspirat ions of t he syst ems t hey con-
flictingly embodied. In their declaration about Europe, the three Greats
affirmed their supremacy.
Though vict orious, t hese ideologies were unable t o organise t he
universe in t heir own image. Europe was t hus divided bet ween regimes
more and more Stalinist to the East and liberally structured societies to the
West . Soon, what came t o be known as t he iron curt ain guarded by t he
soviet army would isolate Central and Eastern Europe from the rest of the
old continent and, beyond that, from the free world until the beginning
of the 1990s.
The Resistance.
From 1941, while Hitler s Germany took over practically the whole
of Europe, some clearly envisaged the rapidly disenchanted future that
was to follow the Second World War if, once freed from the yoke they
were under, t he Europeans did not succeed in solving t heir problems
within a framework that was to be neither that of national sovereignties
nor that of the alliances.
In Italy, it was the anti-fascists, such as Altiero Spinelli, future found-
er and leader of the Movimento Federalista Europeo, a once communist
militant, given a custodial sentence at the age of 20, in 1927, and Ernesto
Rossi, mathematician, ex editor of the cultural publication LAstrolabio,
15
who decided to begin action for the European federation, even prior to the
liberation of the south of the peninsula. Their Manifesto was circulat ed
since June 1941, from the small island of Ventotene, in the Gulf of Gaete,
where Mussolini s regime had imprisoned them, and in the main Italian
cities, notably in Milan and Rome. It was in Ventotene, in fact, that
Spinelli was exposed t o t he American federalist experience, whilst
reading Hamilton, and that a long intellectual journey led him to chal-
lenge Marxism. The Ventotene manifesto advocated the organisation of
post -war Europe on t his new basis: democracy must blossom int o a
federation. Those who wanted to reinstate the Europe of the national
sovereignties, whether their political complexion be right or left,
would hencefort h be seen as conservat ives; t hose who inst ead went
beyond t he illusion of nat ional sovereignt y would be seen as progres-
sive.
The Dutch writer and federalist Henri Brugmans, first rector of the
Collge europen of Bruges, who furthermore opposed the constitution-
alist vision of Europe as suggest ed by Alt iero Spinelli, wrot e as much in
his work on European unity

by saying that the Ventotene prisoners
Manifesto was wit hout a doubt t he most well reasoned document , for
this era, in our field.
The authors of the Manifesto were men of action who since the lib-
eration of southern Italy had been in touch with the antifascist partisans,
who were fight ing t he forces of Mussolini. They also influenced t he
clandestine movements in the north of Italy. Notably, Ernesto Rossi
endeavoured to accomplish this mission in Switzerland.
It was during May 1943 that the first issue of the clandestine Italian
publicat ion LUnit europea was published in Rome. The edit or was a
young journalist, Guglielmo Usellini, who for many years was the Gen-
eral Secret ary of t he European Union of Federalist s, based in rue de
l Arcade in the Parisian quarter of Place de la Madeleine.
On the 27
th
, 28
th
and 29
th
of August 1943, the different federalist
groups within Italy met in Milan to co-ordinate their activities and
est ablish t he basis for t he Movimento Federalista Europeo. The first
official conference was in Venice in October of 1946.
In France, the European post-war idea extricated little by little its
federalist hopes from the Resistance.
On the French territory, it was especially under the impetus of Henri
Frenay, who led the Combat movement during t he Resist ance, and who
subsequent ly became t he Minist er for prisoners of war and lat er t he
president of the European Union of Federalists, that European ideas
16
began to be expressed in the form of clandestine lampoons, with Alexandre
Marc, Albert Camus and ot hers.
An officer by profession, involved in the most dramatic underground
events, on the 12
th
December 1943 Henri Frenay wrote in the clandestine
journal Combat: the men of the French resistance are reaching out to
men of other nations. Together they want to rebuild their country and then
Europe... European resistance will be the cement of future unions The
governments of today must remember this: it is the people who will
impose t he necessary unions
Another clandestine journal Libration Zone-Sud of the 10
th
of
January 1943, noted, for its part, and in this spirit, that it was necessary
to build a post-war Europe on the limitations of the national sovereign-
ties, on a federation of nations and the Lyons regional programme of the
Mouvement de Libration Nationale declared that: a Society of nations
conceived as a League of sovereign St at es is inevit ably an illusion, we
intend to fight for the establishment of a European, democratic federa-
tion, open to all nations
If at the time and during the Resistance the aspiration towards Europe
was simply a matter for a few, the German historian Walter Lipgens still
believes they are responsible for the fact that, on three occasions, the
European federation is cited as being the objective of the war in the
French clandest ine press.
In his work Lide europenne
4
Henri Brugmans makes some inter-
esting points regarding the situation in the Netherlands. In particular he
quotes the case of a financial manager of Prussian origin, Dr H.D.
Salinger who worked closely wit h t he illegal Dut ch group Je
maintiendrai, who studied the problem of a destroyed Germany follow-
ing the world war. Under the pseudonym Hades, he drafted a project
called Die Wiedergeburt von Europa which circulat ed clandest inely.
Salinger imagined a Europe made up of int egrat ed regional groups
structured within a federal framework. Following the war he was one of
the creators of Laction europenne nederlandaise.
In Great Brit ain, federalist and European ideas cont inued t o be
manifest, despite the war. They found an echo in a group like the New
Commonwealth Society and especially within the Federal Union
movement founded in the 1930s. The role of the Federal Union was to be
important, as we will see, in the gestation of the European and World
federalist movement at the end of the war.
We must still mention the European aspirations that animated a
number of Germans in the Resistance. Henri Brugmans quotes Karl-
17
Friedrich Goerdeler, ex burgomaster of Leipzig, who would have been
chancellor if the assassination attempt on Hitler on the 20
th
of July 1944
had been successful. Goerdeler had foreseen t he const it ut ion of a Euro-
pean federation. Captured in western Prussia on the 12
th
of August 1944
he died from hanging at the hands of the Nazis.
For his part, Eugen Kogon, who was one of the first to be imprisoned
in the concentration camps, was to be a determining factor in the
constitution of the European Union of Federalists in post-war Germany.
He was to be the first president of the Europa-Union Deutschland.
Finally, we are more familiar with the story of Hans and Sophie Scholl,
and t hat of some st udent s of t he Universit y of Munich who set up, wit h
t heir Professor Huber, t he clandest ine group Die weisse Rose. Prior to
being arrested and decapitated in February 1943, in one of their leaflets
they launched an appeal to the constitution of a Federal Germany within
a federalised Europe, so that Prussian militarism should never again
come to power.
The First International Meetings.
The first international meetings of the European members of the
resistance from Norway, Denmark, France, Italy, Germany, the Nether-
lands, but also from Poland and Czechoslovakia took place in Geneva
during the months of March, April, May and July 1944. K. F. Goerdeler,
who has already been ment ioned, was among t hose present who had come
to discuss projects secretly on the shores of Lake Lman. At the time war
was raging in West ern Europe since t he allied Normandy landings in
June: France had not been set free and northern Italy was under Hitler s
army.
Geneva saw the first truly European manifesto that stemmed from
the war. The European manifesto of Ventotene was due, in actual fact, to
some Italian federalists. The manifesto of European resistance that
claimed the creation of a federal union between European people came
from Europeans from a number of different nationalities, even though it
had been strongly influenced by the Ventotene manifesto. Thus, the
different count ries around t he world were urged t o go beyond t he dogma
of absolut e sovereignt y of t he st at es. So, it was assert ed t hat only a
federal union would allow the German people to adopt a European
lifestyle without it being a danger to others: only one federal Union
would allow to resolve border problems in the areas of mixed popula-
t ion, and t hese would also cease t o be t he object of crazy nat ionalist ic
18
desires. Only a federal Union would favour t he safeguarding of
democratic institutions in Europe and the economic rebuilding of the
continent. In order to do this the federal Union should eventually consist
of:
1) a government answerable to the people of the different member
states, to be able to exercise a direct jurisdiction within the limits of its
powers;
2) an army under its command;
3) a supreme court to deal with questions relating to the interpretation
of the federal constitution.
Moreover, in March 1945, at a time when the death throes of the 3
rd
Reich were beginning, since t he lat t er was t o surrender on t he 8
th
of May,
the first international conference of European federalists took place in
Paris on the initiative of the Comit franais pour la fdration europenne
originating from the Resistance. The conference was possible after the
retreat of the German army from the occupied territories. Between the
22
nd
and the 24
th
of March, this committee presented itself as the first
rallying centre for democratic and socialist forces with a view to a
common federalist action. It brought together different types of people,
such as t he writ er Albert Camus who made t he opening speech, Alt iero
Spinelli, John Hynd the Labour Member of Parliament, etc..
For this committee the European federation was but a first step
t owards a worldwide federat ion: it was t o allow t he solut ion of t he
German problem in the same spirit as it had animated the resistance of the
left against Nazism and in opposition to all antagonistic blocs.
Integral Federalism.
Nevertheless, we would be far from accounting for the complexity of
reality if we did not highlight an attempt of another kind, which took
shape in France in October 1944, and strongly contributed to the devel-
opment of the federalist movements of this country. This attempt was
made by a group of former teachers, impregnated with doctrines from the
Tour du Pin social Catholicism on the one side and Proudhonian com-
munalism on the other. At first, set up as Centre dtudes institutionelles
pour lorganisation de la socit franaise La Fdration, t his group
was not concerned with the European perspective. It was not until 1945
and especially in 1946 that this perspective took its place in the debates
and t he publicat ions of La Fdration. Originally it was mainly con-
cerned wit h est ablishing a social order in France based on t he profession,
19
the profession-based trade unionism, and the community. In short, a
doct rine t hat was close in cert ain aspect s t o t he concerns of t he survivors
of the publication Ordre Nuveau, which, in the 1930s, had given rise to
a wave of new ideas: federalist Personalism.
The first brochure published by La Fdration, France, Terre des
liberts already developed, against Jacobinical centralisation, the per-
spect ives of what was soon t o be called Int ernal Federalism, t o
distinguish it from European Federalism or Internationalism. Fi-
nally, we must remember concurrently to this endeavour, again in France,
the birth of a movement of socialist ideas, having a federalist and com-
munitarian orientation. It was a resistance group, under the name of
Mouvement national rvolutionnaire (MNR), which brought together
socialist trade unionists and ex communist or libertarian militants, from
January 1945, with an avant-garde publication called Cahiers de le
Rpublique moderne. This socialist and federalist movement denounced
the political power of the trusts as well as the nationalisations in fact
t he st at e ownership of some important enterprises of the time, and
called for the creation of a federal Europe as a third power against the
USSR and the United States of America.
The essent ial charact erist ic of t hese t wo groups, La Fdration and
La RpubliqueModerne, inspired by t he int egral federalist ideas of
Alexandre Marc, even though one was clearly right wing and the other
left wing, was that they were federalists before being Europeans.
Therefore, in the eyes of their leaders, Europe was not so much an aim as
a framework objective for a new society. Right from the beginning the
main federalist movements in France were therefore as much sensitive to
t he disorder of t he democrat ic and social inst it ut ions t hat t hey wit nessed
around them, as they were to the disorder of the relations between the
sovereign states on an international level. At the same time as being fertile
ground for federalist act ion, t his French feat ure was no doubt t o become
an additional element of complexity, as men and movements would have
to shift from ideas to realisations and action.
It was in France, in Wallonia and in Switzerland that the ideas of this
federalist movement were therefore developed immediately after the
Second World War. It was at this time that the Rflections sur la violence
by Georges Sorel were re-published. It was t hen t hat Alexandre Marc
circulated his chosen Proudhon texts. The work of the Swiss writer Adolf
Gasser on t he communal aut onomy had t heir biggest success in Paris,
while t he writ er Jean-Franois Gravier denounced t he wrongdoings of
the centralising state in a very widely read book, Paris et le dsert
20
franais. New ideas about enterprise began to form everywhere. In the
face of the models offered by the traditional capitalist enterprises or by the
state enterprise, the movement Communaut circulat ed in France essays
on the achievement of work communities that existed here and there at an
experimental stage. On the 31
st
of August and 1
st
of September 1946, a
Community conference was held in Paris. The ideas developed were
close to those of the Italian movement Comunit founded by t he great
Italian industrialist, Adriano Olivetti.
So, within the institutional and ideological chaos of the post-war
years, while the soviet Stalinist threat was progressively taking over from
the Hitlerite and fascist totalitarianisms, France and of course it is not
the only case! may seem like a huge field of experiences, where many
proved to be ephemeral anyway, but all of which maintained that they
were foreshadowing the society of tomorrow.
In the same way, everywhere in the free Europe of the time, those who
were contemplating ways to build an international, European, regional,
community or enterprise society, that would safeguard the freedom of
men, were trying to act and reassemble.
When suddenly, on t he 19
th
of September 1946, Winston Churchill s
hist orical speech rang out : Europeans! We must build a kind of Unit ed
States of Europe! a stunned world learned that the great Victorian
conservat ive who had been one of t he most uncompromising adversaries
of Hitlerite Germany, was calling the Europeans to revolution!
III. From Zurich to Montreux (1946 1947)
In fact, it was with such a force that the man, who personified the
British wish of not giving in to the Hitlerite enterprise during the Second
World War, said almost prophet ically, when observing t he desolat e scene
of Europe:
Among the victors there is a Babel of jarring voices; among the
vanquished t he sullen silence of despair. That is all t hat Europeans,
grouped in so many ancient St at es and nat ions have got Yet all the
while there is a remedy which, if it were generally and spontaneously
adopt ed, would as if by a miracle t ransform t he whole scene, and would
in a few years make all Europe, or the greater part of it, as free and as
happy as Swit zerland is t oday We must build a sort of United States
of Europe There is already a natural grouping in the Western Hemi-
sphere. We British have our own Commonwealth of Nations. These do
not weaken, on the contrary they strengthen, the world organisation...
21
And why should t here not be a European group which could give a sense
of enlarged patriotism and common citizenship to the distracted peoples
of this turbulent and mighty continent?
In order that this should be accomplished, there must be an act of
faith I am now going to say something that will astonish you: the first
step in the re-creation of the European family must be a partnership
between France and Germany But I must give you warning. Time may
be short The fight ing has st opped; but t he dangers have not st opped
If we are to form the United States of Europe, or whatever name or form
it may take, we must begin now... We must re-create the European family
in a regional structure called, it may be, the United States of Europe. The
first step is to form a Council of Europe. If at first all the States of Europe
are not willing or able to join the Union, we must nevertheless proceed
to assemble and combine those who will and those who can... Therefore
I say to you: Let Europe arise!
No doubt , t he st ir caused by t his speech t ook not hing away from t he
merit of those who came before Churchill and, as we have already said,
in almost all of Western Europe, certain initiatives had been taken prior
to the end of war in this domain. Some would even say that having
glamorously fixed a date in September 1946, since the beginning Church-
ill influenced the movement for European unity, furnishing it, willingly
or unwillingly, wit h a conservat ive and unique colouring, even t hough in
his Zurich speech he was careful to say that Great Britain and the British
Commonwealt h would be friends and sponsors of t he new Europe
without being a member of the United States of Europe in the same way
as the countries of the continent.
No doubt , but we cannot deny t hat t he Zurich speech act ed as a
det onat or. The press everywhere echoed his words.
From Hertenstein to the Creation of the U.E.F.
At the same time, on the shores of the Lac des Quatre-cantons, in
Hertenstein, federalist militants from fourteen European countries, met
on the initiative of the Swiss Europa-Union (founded in 1934). The
federalist meeting in Hertenstein was held from the 15
th
to the 22
nd
of
September 1946. Its participants, often originating from the Resistance,
had a precise objective: to form a true movement.
The future Union of European Federalists (UEF) stemmed from this
first meeting. They adopted a common declaration, and it was to notably
influence the constitution of the federalist movement in post-war Ger-
22
many. The first statutes of the Europa-Union Deutschland, adopted in
1949, explicitly refer to the Hertenstein declaration as the ideological
base. In twelve points this declaration laid the first foundation of a
common perspective. In actual fact, it called for a European community
based on the federalist principles. This community, seen as a constituent
element of a World Union, had to have the essential attributes of sov-
ereignty on a political, economic and military level.
The European federation conceived at Hertenstein underlined the
need for legal regulat ions t o govern social life. It recommended a
European citizen s charter based on the respect of human beings. Else-
where the Hertenstein declaration stated that the European federation
should be made up of regional sub-federat ions, and t hat it ought t o
guarantee the integrity of each member national community. It was in the
post-second world war European literature that the phrase European
Communit y was used a number of successive t imes wit hin t he declara-
tion of intentions itself.
In Hertenstein they were obviously still thinking of a constitution for
a global Europe and not of a Western Europe including Germany sepa-
rated from central and Eastern Europe by an iron curtain. The regional
sub-federat ions would t hus respect ively group t he Lat in, Germanic,
Nordic, Anglo-Saxon and Slavonic countries.
Elsewhere, in September 1946, the United Nations that were organ-
ised since the beginning of that year were still adorned with all their
prestige and it was not surprising that the Hertenstein federalists, refer-
ring particularly to article 52 of the UN charter, listed among their wishes
the constitution of a world-wide Union. Some months afterwards, the
UEF materialised its aspirations when it chose the motto One Europe in
a unit ed world.
The Hertenstein meeting was very strongly influenced by the Dutch
and Swiss federalist s. Among t hose present we find Henri Brugmans
who, in December 1946, became the first president of the Union of Euro-
pean Federalist s.
A month after the Hertenstein meeting, another federalist meeting
was called in Luxemburg, spurred on this time by the British leaders of
the movement Federal Union who had established contacts with the
different French federalist groups, t he young Movimento Federalista
Europeo in Italy and the American association United World Federal-
ist.
The meeting in Luxemburg, clearly oriented towards international-
ism since it included not only European delegat es but also Hindus,
23
Americans and New Zealanders, succeeded in clarifying t he organisa-
tional side of things. It was understood, in fact, that a European secretariat
would come into being in Paris in December 1946, and that its objective
was to be that of collating and co-ordinating the activities of movements
in favour of a federalist Europe. An international secretariat would be set
up in New York with the purpose of promoting the idea of a universal
government.
Finally, it was actually in Paris on the 15
th
and 16
th
of December 1946
that the Union of European Federalists was officially set up. The meeting
was held at the headquarters of the movement La fdration, 9 rue Auber
in the Quartier de lOpra. First of all it gave the impression of huge
diversity: even though the objective was that of constituting a Union of
European federalists, many participants continued to give priority to
world-wide federalism. Some of t he groups represent ed were only
interested in a federation of Europe, others thought above all about the
organisation of a federalist society in Europe. Some referred gladly to the
Anglo-Saxon conception of federalism. The others referred more to the
libert arian and Proudhonian sources. Such an amalgamat ion would
inevitably bring to the surface the doctrinal divergences and the political
incomprehension, which, as the years went by, were to complicate the life
of the movement.
At the meeting, under the presidency of Gaston Riou, author of a
premonitory book published in 1928, entitled Europe ma patrie, some
unanimous decisions were made confirming the definitive constitution of
the UEF (with a statute in accordance with Helvetian legislation), by
making t he headquart ers in Swit zerland (Palais Wilson in Geneva)
setting up the secretariat in Paris, and giving the responsibility for the
latter to Alexandre Marc, who also became, with Henri Brugmans as
president, the first general secretary of the UEF. When the delegates
parted company in the freezing streets of Paris in that month of December
1946, the first post-war European expectations had at last been crystal-
lised.
In 1947, this expectation was defined even more. On the 4
th
of March,
the French government had signed a treaty of alliance with Great Britain,
in which they more or less acknowledged that the aim was to avoid the
rebirt h of a possible German danger, but t his at t it ude soon changed
over the following months, since one after another the European coun-
tries controlled by the soviet army were forced, whether they liked it or
not, to submit to communist or pseudo-socialist governments, under the
thumb of Joseph Stalin. Meanwhile the United Nations Organisation,
24
torn between the contradictory influences of the Kremlin and the White
House, far from going in the direction of an international government,
gave off t he first signs of powerlessness.
The decisive turning point was in Harvard on the 5
th
of June 1947, with
the sensational speech made by general Marshall, American secretary of
state, when he offered the whole of Europe, in the name of the United
St at es, unprecedent ed financial help, free assist ance t hat would be
decisive to prevent Europe from exposing itself to an economic, social
and political breakdown.
On the 15
th
of July sixteen Western European countries accepted the
principle of this American assistance, and in order to divide more than 12
million dollars in aid in four years, they decided to set up a committee of
economic cooperation that began effectively on the 16
th
of April 1948, as
the Organisation for European Economic Cooperation (OEEC which
became known as OECD in 1960).
Stalin s USSR refused America s offer. Better still, it decided to
counteract what it called economic imperialism with a more complete
and a quicker takeover by its partisans of Eastern European countries. In
September 1947, it created the Kominform, a sort of new Komintern on
the scale of a post-second world war Europe. The choice the Europeans
had to make in these circumstances marked the beginning of the great
European divide. Within the scope of economic cooperation created by
the Marshall plan, the forces favourable to the unity of a free Europe and
to democracy were to expand rapidly in addressing the different sectors
of public opinion.
The European Movements.
A crop of European movements was to manifest itself, in fact, among
which, two important tendencies were to quickly affirm themselves: the
unionist s and t he federalist s.
The Unionists, that is to say the partisans of a European Union in the
wider sense of t he word, followed close behind Winst on Churchill who,
on the 14
th
of May 1947, instigated the creation in London of the United
Europe Movement, at a meeting held at the Albert Hall. He subsequently
became its president. To begin with we must link this movement with the
independent League for economic cooperation, later known as Ligue
Europenne de Coopration Economique. Created by Paul Van Zeeland,
ex Belgian Minister for Foreign Affairs, this league, consisting entirely
of liberal bankers and indust rialist s, assumed t he st at ut e as an int erna-
25
t ional associat ion wit h a scient ific goal. The league subsequent ly played
an important role at the heart of the European movement as a laboratory
for economic and monet ary st udies, and st ill does t o t his day.
Also in London, the socialists, on their part, established the Move-
ment for the Socialist United States of Europe (the future Socialist
Movement for the United States of Europe), which still exists today under
the name of European Left. Its first president was Bob Edwards who
was also president of the Independent Labour Party. The majority of its
first leaders belonged to the left of the Labour Party, and the same goes
for the Socialist SFIO Party in France, but within the party one could also
find key Belgian, Dutch and Spanish figures. The radical orientation of
t he early days was t o change, progressively, especially under t he influ-
ence of Paul-Henry Spaak.
In June 1947 the European Christian Democrats, for their part, created
their common organisation during a meeting near Lige, under the name
of Nouvelles Equipes Internationales. The statute of the NEI (known as
Union Europenne des democrats chrtiensafter 1965) defined their
aims as follows: t o est ablish regular cont act bet ween polit ical groups
and key figures of the different nations inspired by the principles of
Christian democracy, in order to study, in the light of these principles, the
respective national situation as well as the international problems; to
compare experiences and programmes, etc.. Among its precise objec-
tives, the N.E.I. placed great importance on the need for a European
Political Community.
Lastly, in Gstaad, on the 1
st
of September 1947, Count Richard
Coudenhove-Kalergi, returned in 1946 from the United States where he
had been t aking refuge during t he war, present ed a project for a European
constitution, drawn up by the Paneuropean movement whose Legal
Affairs Committee was based in New York from 1943 to 1945. He
influenced the preparation of Churchill s September 1946 speech in
Zurich. He also gave rise to the creation of a European Parliamentary
Union, destined, we are told by Anne-Marie Saint Gille in her excellent
book on Paneurope
5
to act as a prelude to a true parliamentary
assembly.
The UEF Founding Congress: Montreux.
When the federalists were planning their first European congress in
Montreux, due to take place from the 27
th
to the 31
st
of August 1947, the
young Union of European Federalists boasted about thirty member
26
associations in Great Britain, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, The
Net herlands, Germany and It aly. The UEF congress succeeded t he con-
stitutional congress of the Universal Movement for the World Confed-
eration, born in the same Swiss town, which became the Universal
Movement for a World Federation, World association of World Federal-
ist s. Two hundred delegat es and observers from sixt een nat ionalit ies
attended the UEF Congress. It carried the hallmark of the integral
federalist doct rine professed by Denis de Rougemont , Henri Brugmans
and Alexandre Marc. The general political motion of the Montreux Con-
gress was very st rongly influenced by Denis de Rougemont s report on
federalist attitude. It is a masterly text where the federalist is considered
to be at the same time free and committed, as a person and not as an
unspecified and therefore abstract human being. Taking inspiration from
Switzerland s example, Denis de Rougemont lists the principles of
federalism, as he perceived them: a) renouncement of all hegemony; b)
renouncement of all esprit de systme; c) safeguarding of minorit ies; d)
preservation of the qualities of each federated entity; e) Love of
complexity.
A federat ion, he said, is formed gradually t hanks t o people and groups
and not starting from a centre or from governments.
The general political motion of Montreux saw in the federalist idea
a dynamic principle that transforms all human activitiesSolut ion of
synthesis, it is made up of two inextricably linked elements: organic
solidarity and freedom. In other words, the blossoming of the human
being thanks to its everyday life in the communitySt art ing from t he
principles of federalism we have just listed, it is immediately possible to
take the path of a supranational European organisation. The gravity of the
situation in which Europe finds itself requires a federal realisation where
it can be tempted... The federation thus initiated must remain open to
all (European) peoples, even to those who at present, for internal or
external reasons, cannot participate... We must reduce the absolute
sovereignty. A part of this sovereignty must be attributed to a federal
authority t hat possesses essent ially: a) a responsible government ; b) a
supreme Court; c) an armed police force.
In the economic policy motion of Montreux, there is the clear
influence of Alexandre Marc s ideas: all centralised and totalitarian
organisation of the economy, it stated, is totally incompatible with the
fundamental objectives of federalis, all economic organisations must
be based on t he radical decent ralisat ion of economic powers on all
levels and must plan new st ruct ures especially in t he areas of currency
27
and credit, etc..
The texts adopted at Montreux in 1947 were, elsewhere, precursory
texts on two points:
1) the application of these measures in Germany, enabling the use of
its industrial potential and its natural resources for the profit of the whole
of Europe, of which Germany is a part. The Sarre and the Ruhr must be
primers of economic cooperation for the benefit of all Europeans. This
was t he idea t hat inspired Jean Monnet when he advocat ed t he inst it ut ion
of the European Coal and Steel Community.
2) a number of passages from the Montreux resolution in favour of
the Economic Federation of Europe that would try to organise men and
governments, starting in 1957, with the Rome Treaty of European
Economic Community and then, in 1986, with the Single European Act.
Finally, to conclude the chapter on the first European congress and the
post-war years, it must be specified that it was in Montreux in 1947, that
the Germans and the Austrians took part for the first time since the end
of the Third Reich, and on equal footing with other Europeans, in a
democratically convened International Congress.
IV. From The Hague Congress to the Council of Europe (1948/49)
On the eve of 1948, the federalists were not the only ones to develop
a European plan of action. They certainly had a doctrine and they
represented an original movement, non-conformist by nature, but the
traditional political powers were present from then on, set on rebuilding
a democracy in their image.
The 24
th
and 25
th
of February 1948 saw the fall of the Czech president,
the democrat Edouard Bens, and his replacement by the communist
Clment Gottwald. This removed the last possible hopes for creating a
geographically unit ed Europe and of a UNO t hat would bring about
international peace.
The climate therefore was that of the cold war. On the 17
th
of March
1948, the Brussels treaty signed by France, Great Britain, Belgium, The
Net herlands and Luxemburg was a defensive pact bet ween st at es t hat felt
threatened. Moreover, the latter thee countries were linked by a common
customs union: Benelux.
In July 1948, finally, the soviet powers began the blockade of Berlin,
provoking extreme international tension.
To put it simply, one could say that for the Unionists, acting generally
under the inspiration of the British, a United Europe was seen as a
28
natural slogan that would incite a political coalition in the face of soviet
danger. This sizeable union was t o enable t he federalist s t o go much
further towards a real unity of the peoples of the free countries of the old
continent. Momentarily, however, they were both on the same route.
The struggle for European unity was, in actual fact, marked in 1948
by an extremely significant event. It was the invitation to The Hague
between the 7
th
and the 11
th
of May, of true States General of Europe
who were effectively to bring about a series of initiatives. Below are the
ones we consider to be the most important ones: on a militant level, the
European Movement and, on an official level, the Council of Europe
The initiative of this spectacular demonstration came from a very
recent Coordination Committee of Movements for European Unity,
est ablished on t he 11
th
of November 1947 between existing European
movements, including therefore the Union of European Federalists. Only
the Movement for a Socialist United States of Europe thought the
enterprise too Churchill-like, or too conservative, and preferred to re-
main on the fringe.
The official name of t he Le Haye Congress was Congress of
Europe. It was the federalists who spoke about States General, since
the politicians and the militants of the European cause were not the only
delegat es, but found t hemselves wit h represent at ives of t he forces vives
which reflected the true social, economic and cultural face of European
society at the time.
The Ridderzaal Debates.
The presidency of the Congress naturally fell upon Winston Church-
ill, a figurehead of official Europeanism since his Zurich speech in 1946.
Duncan Sandys, son-in-law of Churchill and Joseph Ret inger, anot her
Churchillite figure, were in charge of the effective organisation of the
Congress. It was t o boast 750 delegat es and observers, 200 of which were
members of parliament, and an astonishing number were former and
future ministers or other key figures. Among them I will mention Konrad
Adenauer, former burgomaster of Cologne and president of the German
Christian Democratic union; Lord Belisha, former British minister;
Anthony Eden and Harold Macmillan, former ministers and future Prime
Ministers; Edouard Daladier, former president of the Council of Ministres
who together with Neville Chamberlain was responsible for the ephem-
eral Mnich agreement with Hitler; Edgar Faure, future President of the
Council of Ministers; Professor Hallstein, director of education at the
29
University of Frankfurt; Franois Mitterand then minister for war veter-
ans; the great Italian entrepreneur Adriano Olivetti; Dr Pilet Golaz,
former president of the Helvetian Confederation; Paul Ramadier and Paul
Reynaud, former president s of t he Council of Minist ers; Paul Van
Zeeland, former Prime Minister. Among the committed intellectuals and
milit ant s, t he names t o remember are Henri Brugmans, Denis de
Rougemont , Salvador de Madariaga and Alexandre Marc, who played a
very act ive role in t he Congress, as well as figures such as Raymond and
Robert Aron; Luciano Bolis; Richard Coudenhove Kalergi; Grgoire
Gafenco, ex Rumanian foreign affairs minister, future president of the
UEF. Also important are: Aldo Garosci; Enzo Giacchero, future presi-
dent of the UEF; Claude-Marcel Hytte, editor of the publication La
rpublique moderne; Miss Josephy (Jo t o her friends), colourful and
very active president of the Federal Union European Committee; Henri
Koch, then joint general secretary from Luxembourg of the UEF; Altiero
Spinelli and his wife Ursula (also a delegate); Raymond Rifflet (Belgian),
future president of the European Federalist Movement and of the Euro-
pean Left; Ernesto Rossi, Ernst von Schenck, a figurehead within Euro-
pean federalism in German speaking Switzerland at the time; the writer
Ignazio Silone; Guglielmo Usellini, future general secretary of the UEF;
Andr Voisin, general secretary of the French movement La Fdration;
etc..
The setting for the debates was the medieval hall of knights of the
Netherlands (Ridderzaal) seat of the Dutch parliament. Those who, like
me, there as a special correspondent for a French daily paper, witnessed
t he opening session of t his Congress will always remember t he sight
Churchill presided over the meeting from a rostrum embellished with a
crimson and gold velvet canopy, in t he presence of Princess Juliana who
was t o be crowned queen of t he Net herlands a few mot hs lat er and her
husband Prince Bernard, in t he got hic hall adorned wit h a huge flag wit h
a red E on a white background, the universal symbol of European
movements of the time. It is impossible to relate the main events that
marked this historical meeting lasting almost four days. I have devoted
many pages to this in a book.
6
To return to the matter in hand, the integral
federalist trend tried to assert itself in Ridderzaal, by supporting the
unionist militants who supported the workers unions participating in the
management of the economy and the establishment of a European social
and economic Council against the supporters of the Liberal school.
Equally, at The Hague, the establishment of a Supreme Court of Justice
was advocat ed. A Message t o t he Europeans issued by Denis de
30
Rougemont during t he closing session highlight ed t he main object ives
followed at the time by the federalist thinkers: European Human Rights
Chart; Court of Justice; European Assembly where the forces vives
(today we would call it civil society) would be represented. Lastly, the
partisans of federalism saw above all the fulfilment of their more long-
term objectives, and the partisans of United Europe received immedi-
at e sat isfact ion. As far as t he polit ical conclusions of t he Congress are
concerned, t hey ensued from a double premise: on t he one hand, it had
been stated that any European Union project would have no practical
value without Great Britain (it was the main motive for a 144 member
strong British delegation) and, on the other, that complete unification of
Europe could only be reached progressively.
In order t o reach t he object ives, it was necessary t o est ablish an
extraordinary Council of Europe. European governments would only
be able to take part in the activities of the Council of Europe by signing
a common declaration of human rights. An independent European court
would be creat ed. It would have t he right t o inspect polit ical proceedings
and national elections. A European mixed armed force could be set up in
order t o re-est ablish t he law. A deliberat ing European Assembly would
be founded. It would not have a legislat ive funct ion, but it would offer
enlightened advice, its members would be nominated from within and
out side t he nat ional parliament s. Subsequent ly t hey would be allowed t o
be elected. The federalists for their part saw that they could make some
further elaborated plans in order to provide for a common citizenship,
European armed forces, a true elected parliament, etc..
This mount ain of good int ent ions was in fact brought about by t he
Council of Europe. One thing is certain: the European infatuation of The
Hague Congress was ext raordinary. Henri Brugmans wrot e on t his
subject : What we have been missing ever since then is the feeling of
enthusiasm and fervour that reigned in May 1948 never again was t he
European movement to experience such vigour, such a desire to succee.
7
The Birth of the European Movement.
The period that followed the May 1948 Congress saw above all a
reinforcement of European action. Voluntarily absent from the Le Haye
Congress, on account of the predominant role played by Churchill, the
heads of the Movement for a Socialist United States of Europe could no
longer ignore t he repercussions of t he Congress of Europe, and decided
to adhere to the Coordination Committee of the European Unity Move-
31
ments, whose president was none other than Churchill s own son-in-
law: the very honourable Duncan Sandys. In the autumn of 1948, this
committee (Joint committee) became the European Movement,
under the honorary presidency of Blum, Churchill and De Gasperi. The
founder movements continued all the while to play an essential part
wherever act ion was possible.
One consequence of the constitution of the European Movement was
that it called into question the principles of the existence of an autono-
mous federalist European movement. In any case, the problem was
addressed at the UEF Rome Congress (Rome, Palazzo Venezia 7
th
to 11
th
November 1948). Finally the Congress reaffirmed the autonomy and the
unity of the UEF. Henri Frenay, one of the French resistance leaders, was
given the task of maintaining this unity and this autonomy. He became the
president of the central committee and Henri Brugmans was president of
the executive committee. The resolution on the European assembly
adopt ed by t he second UEF congress in Rome, st at ed specifically: t he
need for a Represent at ive European Assembly t o be called urgent ly
destined to prepare the constitution for a federate Europe. This same
Rome Congress was also involved in a pilot st udy for t he European
constitution devised by Alexandre Marc, with the collaboration of the
federalist writer/historian Bernard Voyenne and the Belgian academic
Jean Buchmann.
The Birth of the Council of Europe.
On the 5
th
of May 1949 a treaty signed in London established the
statute of the Council of Europe. It therefore only took another year before
the first official decisions were made following the declarations of The
Hague Congress of 7-11 May 1948. That is to say that the genesis of the
Council of Europe was particularly quick thanks to an exceptionally
favourable climate.
On the 18
th
of August 1948, the international committee for the
coordination of European Unity movements submitted a memorandum
about t he result s of The Hague congress t o t he five member st at es of t he
Brussels Treaty. During the preliminary phase, there were two opposing
arguments: the French/Belgian argument about the European assembly s
driving force, the British argument that favoured the superiority of the
Council of Ministers. The historian Pierre Duclos wrote the following in
his work on the Council of Europe published in Paris in the collection
Que sais-je? in 1960: Everything was sorted out because on the 27
th
and
32
28
th
of January 1949 it was decided t hat a Council of Europe should be
established. It would consist of a ministerial committee meeting in pri-
vat e. There would also be an advisory body and it s meet ings would be
public.
In fact, it was the most minimalist interpretation of the outcome of the
Hague Congress t hat prevailed under Brit ish pressure, in exchange for a
concession made to their continental partners, especially the French: the
choice of St rasburg, capit al of Alsace, as t he seat of t he Council of
Europe.
Such was t he realit y but , in many respect s, here was a paradox,
because the political unity of Europe had well and truly become a topical
theme. The free countries of Europe were regaining confidence, the first
beneficial effects of the Marshall aid were starting to be felt, whilst, on
the 4
th
of August 1949, Washingt on signed t he At lant ic Pact and t hus in
the name of defence linked the destiny of western Europe with that of
North America. It was therefore within this warm atmosphere that on the
10
th
of August of t he same year t he inaugural meet ing of t he Advisory
Board of the Council of Europe took place in Strasburg. There were ten
founder countries: the five signatories of the Brussels treaty (France,
Great Britain and the Benelux countries) who had taken the initiative, and
Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Ireland and Italy. Soon they were to be
joined by Greece, Turkey, Iceland, and among ot hers, t he Federal
German Republic in 1951.
As soon as the UEF had time to reflect on the birth of the Council of
Europe, that is to say, on the Treaty of London, it set about airing its
critical views. In particular the UEF attacked the rule of unanimity within
the Council of Ministers, the limitation on the topics the assembly had the
right t o discuss, and it s lack of any real power. The UEF cent ral
committee therefore asked the most federalist members of parliament,
who were t o sit in St rasburg, t o ensure t hat t he Assembly deemed it
necessary for the free nations of Europe to sign a true federal pact.
Now, in 1949, the influence of the young Union of European Feder-
alists was by no means insignificant. Notably, it was at the heart of the
creation of a Permanent committee for European municipalities and
regions of the interuniversity federalist union presided over by Michel
Mouskhly, professor at the University of Strasburg. In Italy the Movi-
mento Federalista Europeo from then on grouped together all the or-
ganised federalist s of t he peninsula and cont rolled t he It alian European
movement itself. The same situation tended to occur in Germany with the
Europa-Union Deutschland, and in Belgium where the federalists ani-
33
mated pretty much all the constituent groups of the European Movement.
Above all, t he federalist s endeavoured, t hough knowing t he limit s of
their attempt, to draw the best party possible from the Council of Europe,
once t he Advisory Assembly had organised it s debat es. The Members of
Parliament influenced by the federalists were, in fact, numerous within
the Strasburg assembly. The most important amendment of the whole of
the first meeting was that of Ronald MacKay, British Labour Member of
Parliament, and partisan of federalism. Henceforth, according to this
amendment , t he advisory assembly saw as it s aim and it s object ive t he
establishment of a European political authority with limited functions
but real power. This amendment, which became a recommendation of
the Assembly, was voted for with no abstentions by 88 votes to 0, on the
4
th
of September 1949. Although it was adopted under the most favour-
able condit ions, it was st ill prompt ly laid aside by t he Council of
Minist ers, t hus confirming t hat t he worries t he federalist s had regarding
t he St rasburg inst it ut ion were unfort unat ely well founded!
Nevert heless, t he federalist s brought t o St rasburg t he fight for t he
establishment of a European Court of Justice. It was their one and only
t angible success of t his period.
8
In actual fact, the principle of the Court
of Just ice undermined t he principle of absolut e sovereignt y of t he st at es,
since from then on individuals and communities could refer to it for any
implication of rights guaranteed by the Council of Europe.
Despite this limited success the UEF was the first among European
movements of the time to be convinced of the powerlessness of the
Council of Europe to overcome obstacles in the way of the European
federation. In order to get out of the impasse it was in, the UEF tried a
number of different ways. It began a campaign in favour of the European
Assembly t o be elect ed by universal suffrage; it called for a simple
majority vote within the Council of Ministers, which, moreover, was to
become a Chamber of the States.
At the end of October 1949, a UEF extraordinary general meeting
took place in Paris to ask that the Assembly of the Council of Europe draft
the text for a federal pact, during its next meeting, creating a European
authority.
V. 1950: The turning point
Aft er a long and arduous st ruggle, on t he 20
th
and 21
st
of January 1950
in London, the UEF was able to ensure that the International Executive
Committee of the European Movement, always with a strong British
34
influence, came round, at last, to the federal pact. The condition however
was t he dist inct ion of t he t wo possible geographical areas of European
unity and two different degrees of cooperation and integration: certain
countries (like Great Britain or the Scandinavian States) were manifestly
undecided on t he st ep t o be t aken, be it small, t owards t he t ransfer of
sovereignty. Wherever they were active, the federalists tried to affect
public opinion, together with the Movement for the Socialist United
St at es of Europe and t he Nouvelles equipes internationales (Christian
Democrats) in support of the federal pact. Notably in France, Germany
and Italy they conducted in-depth popular activity. In Italy the project was
even approved by t he It alian parliament and signed by prest igious figures
such as Alcide De Gasperi and Count Sforza, President of t he Council and
Foreign affairs Minister of the Republic of Italy respectively.
To further widen their claims, the federalists also decided to organise
a meeting in Strasburg of militants, political figures and representatives
of the European forces vives, very close to the Official Council of
Europe Assembly. They gave their unofficial meeting the name of
European Council of Vigilance or Council of the Peoples of Europe. Its
objective was to force the members of Parliament within the Advisory
Assembly to face up to their responsibilities. Henri Frenay presided over
the International Organising Committee.
The European Council of Vigilance met on the 21
st
to the 24
th
of
September 1950, and then on the 29
th
of November 1950 in the large
Orangerie Hall in Strasburg. It deemed it necessary for the Democratic
St at es of Europe, who wished t o do so, t o sign a t reat y calling a European
Const it uent Assembly as soon as possible, t o draft a Federal Union Pact .
This appeal, t hough undersigned by some import ant figures, did not have
t he desired success. On t he 13
th
of November 1950, the British Labour
Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Ernest Davies, had also officially
let it be known that His Majesty s government was opposed to all
amendments of the Treaty of London.
Between the Ridderzaal and the Orangerie, the hopes riding on the
Council of Europe were already dwindling From then on the centre of
gravity of the European Union lay elsewhere: in the gestation of an
integrated Europe stemming from six states, initiated by the European
Coal and Steel Community (ECSC). The last phase of this disintegration
of any perspective of developing the Council of Europe into a political
Europe was attained on the 11
th
of December 1951, when Paul-Henri
Spaak decided t o st ep down as president of t he Advisory Assembly in a
moment described as reasoned indignat ion.
35
The Labour Party in power in Great Britain at the time condemned any
idea of a supranat ional assembly, being of t he opinion t hat it would be
anti-socialist or non socialist. Moreover, it accused the parliamentary
assembly of the Council of Europe of having played the part of a sort of
unofficial opposition to certain European governments, including the
United Kingdom. For their part, the conservatives showed more and more
caution with regards to European projects. The British president of the
European Movement International Executive, Sir Duncan Sandys, ten-
dered his resignation. He was a member of the Conservative Party.
Robert Schumans Statement.
Within this rather disappointing context, Robert Schuman s state-
ment of the 9
th
of May 1950 marked a decisive turning point in the politics
of European Unification.
Jean Monnet, who had inspired the European Coal and Steel Commu-
nity project, politically run by the French Foreign Minister Robert
Schuman, himself had nothing of the traditional politician. Sixty years
old at the time, this little known self-taught person was the great in-
spiration behind the first community projects. Commissaire gnral au
Plan in France, it is t rue t hat he had subsequent ly been Joint General
Secretary of the SDN, banker, councillor of a number of governments,
and a de Gaulle government member in Algiers. He was efficient, discrete
and methodical. He was to leave his mark, from 1950 and for many years,
on the creation of Europe. It is therefore correct to say that if the driving
force behind the post-war European ideal was the federalist movement,
since 1950 Jean Monnet was a key figure in the history of the unification
of Europe. What we need, had stated the UEF Montreux Congress in
1947, is to create the nucleus of the coal and heavy industry authorities
in Europe. This idea was revisited in one of the numerous recommenda-
t ions of t he St rasburg Advisory Assembly t o t he Council of Minist ers. It
took shape thanks to Robert Schuman, man of frontiers, German-born
French Foreign Minister, who witnessed the virtual standstill of the
Council of Europe. But the idea of a European Coal and Steel Community
began to take shape thanks to Jean Monnet and his team. The content of
the speech of the 9
th
of May 1950, that was at the origin of the treaty of
Paris, is widely known. In t he prologue it was said t hat t he ECSC would
be the first step towards European federation, thus fixing the foreign
policy objective of the founder countries who accepted the principle of a
supranational common High Authority for coal and steel.
36
In any case, the federalists saw the Monnet-Schuman initiative as the
most daring of European actions presented by governments since the war.
They thought that for the first time the principles of the sacrosanct
national sovereignty were being undermined at a governmental level. In
fact, the partisans of European unity did not fail to notice that an effective
control over coal and steel would quickly mean the same European
control in other areas. It would require, in other words in this time of
extreme international tension between the democratic and the communist
worlds,
9
the organisation of a Defence Community and European politi-
cal institutions along the same supranational principles.
In fact, the Korean conflict lead Washington to ask the question about
the participation of the Federal German Republic in western defence, and
that of the reconstitution of a national German army, at the time feared
within European circles, especially in France. This is why the partisans
of Europe generally welcomed or at any rate resigned themselves to the
declaration of the French government on the 24
th
of October 1950. It
advocated the creation of an integrated European army, allowing the
participation of Germans to Western defence, without rebuilding a
German administration system. During the drafting of the treaty that was
to establish the EDC, the Union of European Federalists endeavoured to
play a role in accordance with its reservations, underlining the need to
reach a supranational or federal political power, without which there
would not be a European army as such. Thanks to the actions of its
leaders, notably its chief representative, Altiero Spinelli, acting through
the intermediary of the Italian Socialist Member of Parliament Ivan
Matteo Lombardo, an article was introduced into the treaty of the
European Defence Community signed on the 27
th
of May 1952. Article
38 stated that the Assembly controlling the European army was to
propose a further federal or confederal structure, based on the principle
of the separation of powers and comprising in particular a bicameral
representative system.
VI. The Turning Years: 1951, 1952, 1953, 1954
The negotiations for the signature of the treaty establishing the ECSC
took place swiftly. The treaty was signed in Paris by France, Italy, the
Federal Republic of Germany and the Benelux countries on the 18
th
of
April 1951. The parliaments of the six states concerned ratified it without
too many difficulties during the winter of 1951-1952 and the spring of
1952, thus enabling the Europe in the making to quickly have its first
37
limited but real institutional framework.
Little Europe was born boasting 160 million inhabitants. Its first
capital was Luxemburg where in August 1952 Jean Monnet and the
High Aut horit y t ook residence and where he assumed t he role of presi-
dent at the outset. Within the limits of competence bestowed upon it by
the treaty, declared Jean Monnet on the 10
th
of August , t o celebrat e t he
establishment of the new institution the High Authority... has direct
dealings with the enterprises. It obtains financial resources, not from
St at e cont ribut ions, but from direct levies set up on t he product ions it is
responsible for. It is responsible, not to the States, but to a European
assembly. The Assembly was elect ed by nat ional parliament s, and it is
foreseen that it may even be elected directly by the people... The
Assembly cont rols our act ions. It has t he power t o give us a vot e of no
confidence. It is the first European Assembly to have sovereign powers.
So, Jean Monnet voluntarily insisted on the most federalist aspects of
the structures set up by the first European community. On the 10
th
of
September 1952 the ECSC Assembly met for the first time in Strasburg
and, significantly, the parliamentary personalities most in the public eye
at the time were present. The first debates showed that the main merit of
t he Monnet -Schuman plan was not so much in t he solut ion proposed, but
in the problems that it brought to the surface, at least in order to ensure
a proper functioning of the new community. It very quickly became
apparent that the ECSC must become a part of a wider European unity so
as to ensure that its role was not reduced to that of a technical authority.
During 1952, Europe therefore seemed truly within arm s reach.
First of all, Paul-Henri Spaak having abandoned the presidency of the
Council of Europe Assembly t urned t owards public opinion and chose
the direction of the International European Movement. He did this with
total support from the federalists who, for their part, controlled a sizeable
part of the militant organisations within the six countries, while the
Council of European Municipalities expanded rapidly. A vast European
Yout h Campaign was also developing wit h t ens of t housands of young
people meeting at the Lorelei Camp on the banks of the Rhine. The UEF
meanwhile carried out specific activities concerning war veterans and the
regional press.
During the UEF Congress in March 1952, in Aix-la-Chapelle, under
t he leadership of Adenauer, t he wat chwords of a Federat ed Europe, of a
Supranational Political Community, of a union between France and
Germany kept converging. Rightly so, no doubt, since in the history of
governments, as in that of men, there are specific moments for the ad-
38
vancement of a cause.
In April 1952, Paul-Henri Spaak, inspired by the federalists, gave rise
to the creation of an Action Committee for a European Constituent
Assembly. This later became the Action Committee for a Supranational
Community and the president of the UEF executive committee, Henri
Frenay, was its general secretary. This committee was involved in a
number of actions, notably within the Council of Europe assembly. The
latter, at last, required the governments of the States involved in the EDC
project to give an ad hoc assembly the task of drafting a political
community statute. The French and Italian members of the Action
Committee, headed by the federalists Frenay and Spinelli, had the task of
contacting the leaders of the French members of the ECSC Council of
Ministers and the Italian government. Finally, on the 23
rd
of July 1952 a
Franco-Italian governmental proposition was officially submitted. It
planned to confer the ECSC general assembly the task of managing a
project of a European political authority.
During this period the federalists carried a lot of weight in the
European preparations by the member governments of the first European
community. The latter decided, on the 10
th
of September 1952, during
their meeting in Strasburg, to bestow upon the members of the Commu-
nity Assembly a pre-constituent role. The Franco-Italian proposition,
which had become a government directive, held that the project of a
European community policy treaty ought to be drafted within a period of
six months and consequently submitted to the governments on the 10
th
of
March 1953.
The ad hoc Assembly.
The assembly charged with this elaboration, legally separate from
that of the ECSC, was named ad hoc Assembly. In practical terms, it
appointed a constitutional commission created from within, to prepare
the Political Community project. In total there were twenty-three full
members. The eminent Belgian jurist Fernand Dehousse, vice-president
of the UEF, maintained an effective link with the small federalist staff
headed by Henri Frenay and Altiero Spinelli.
The constitutional commission of the ad hoc Assembly found itself
involved in a project headed by a constitutional commission of the
European Movement made up essentially of jurists, among whom Profes-
sor Carl Fredrich and Robert Bowie of the University of Harvard, and
eminent European jurists such as Professor Georges Scelle, Hans Nawiasky
39
and Calamendrei, joined by federalist figures like Spaak, Frenay and
Spinelli.
There was therefore a perfect chain of initiatives that enabled the
constitutional commission of the ad hoc Assembly to succeed, on the 26
th
of February 1953, in adopting a project that would establish a Supranational
Political Community.
10
Even though it had foreseen the support of a
Council of national Ministers voting unanimously in certain essential
cases, t his could be seen as a decisive st ep t owards a European federat ion.
In fact, the PSC project established a bicameral system: one Chamber to
represent t he people, elect ed by direct universal suffrage, a second
Chamber consisting of senators elected by the national parliaments; a
European Executive Council, consisting of a president elected by the
senat e and members elect ed by t he president , who could be censured by
the Senate or the People s Chamber. The PSC project also included a
Court of Justice and an Economic and Social Council. Lastly, it was
foreseen t hat t he EPC would progressively absorb t he EDC and t he
ECSC, establish a generalised common market and co-ordinate foreign
policies.
On the 9
th
of March 1953 Paul-Henri Spaak, President of the ad-hoc
assembly, handed over t he t reat y project t hat was t o est ablish t he
European Political Community to Georges Bidault, president of the
Council of Ministers of Foreign Affairs. The Belgian statesman recalled
George Washington, President of the American Convention, who at the
Congress on the 17
th
of September 1787 presented the project regarding
the Constitution of the United States of America. However, Georges
Bidault was not in favour of federalism as was Robert Schuman and his
response was disconcert ing Recalling the homage that Elisabeth I of
England had made to the founders of the empire, he quoted the famous
proposal: Greetings to those in search of adventure! But, Mr Bidault
added, We must ensure that governments now look at the difficulties
They must now also look carefully at each of the documents submitted
and then take stock. It was therefore obvious that it was to be they who
would establish the final project. No precise commitment was made!
The last high mass of the partisans of the post-second world war
supranat ional Communit y, was organised by t he federalist s, friends of
Paul-Henri Spaak and Robert Schuman from the 8
th
to the 10
th
of October
in The Hague.
So, the pioneers of European Unity and notably those amongst them
st ill numerous who had at t ended t he first Congress of Europe in
1948 in The Hague, could now, returning to the Ridderzaal of the Dutch
40
parliament five years later, measure the progress. It was the eve of deci-
sive options, be they concerning the Defence Community or the Political
Community projects. They were experiencing the autumn of the great
European hope of t he post -second world war period.
The Dut ch submit t ed a special report on t he need t o est ablish a
common market among the six. The Congress requested that over the
following ten years, the member States of the ECSC set up a single
customs territory. They were also to coordinate effectively the budgetary,
financial, monetary policies, to harmonise social policies, to set up a
common policy on investments, regional policies, etc.. Within these
themes we see the driving principles that inspired the drafting of the EEC
treaty, since after the Messina conference in June 1955 the ex-
president of the Action Committee for the supranational Community and
the second Congress of Europe, Paul-Henri Spaak accepted the task of
managing negot iat ions t hat would lead t o t he signing, and t hen t he
ratification, of the Rome treaties.
The 1953 congress participants wished to see the realisation of the
vow made in the same Ridderzaal in May 1948: the time has come for
the nations of Europe, to transfer some of their sovereign rights in order
to be able to exercise them together henceforth. The delegates therefore
asked the militants, Altiero Spinelli and Henri Frenay, responsible for
calling for the second Congress of Europe, to affirm the steadfastness
of their designs where the continuity of their actions could be seen. The
second Congress of The Hague was a beaut iful show of unanimit y wit h
a federalist flame in its speeches, of unfortunately premature optimism
with regard to the chances of ratification of the EDC and the establish-
ment of a Political Community.
There never has been, in fact, a final Supranational Political Commu-
nity project The European Defence Community Treaty was ratified in
Germany, Belgium, Luxemburg and the Netherlands, but before Italy
expressed itself, it was rejected by the French national assembly on the
30
th
of August 1954, in conditions unworthy of a responsible country.
11
The same French national assembly had, in fact, approved the principle
of the EDC on the 19
th
of February 1952, in the same parliamentary
legislat ure. One could devot e a whole st udy on t his failure and especially
on the responsibilities of Pierre Mendes-France, then president of the
Council of Ministers.
It is important to remember that, legally, the Political Community
project depended on the fate of the EDC treaty itself. This having been
rejected, article 38, which represented the legal basis of the process that
41
t he ad hoc Assembly had t aken, was t herefore annulled as well. The hour
of the European federation had passed, for a long time.
The year 1953, that preceded the failure of the EDC, had otherwise
seen a profound change in t he course of event s wit h t he deat h of St alin and
peaceful coexist ence succeeding t he cold war. No doubt , t he change
in the international climate that followed still does not explain everything
in this affair. The ratification of the EDC treaty had come too late, and
French politics had taken a turn profiting to those we now would call
souverainistes. Be that as it may, on the 30
th
of August 1954, the
European construction witnessed a major crisis that also shook the
Atlantic Alliance.
Since the end of the summer of 1954, the diplomats therefore began
their search for an alternative solution that could satisfy at least
Washington, London and Paris and be acceptable to the Federal German
Republic. To this end they created the Western European Union (WEU)
where t he only law making body was a Council of Minist ers, and t he
decisions unanimous. The treaty permitted Germany to rearm as wished
for by the United States, but stripped of all supranationality. This was
confirmed by a resigned majority. Its only apparent advantage was that
it would unite the countries of the first European Community with the
Unit ed Kingdom in a palpable manner, but it was no longer a quest ion of
a Supranational Europe.
At the end of 1954, the militants of Europe found themselves in totally
different circumstances from the previous years. Only the ECSC still
emerged from t he ruins and t he dreams, nevert heless showing by it s
existence that little Europe was not completely shipwrecked. But this
new turn of events momentarily affected the dawning European construc-
tion with precariousness. In actual fact, wrote Henri Brugmans, the vote
of the 30
th
of August requires a nuovo corso. One period in t he st ruggle
for Europe has ended: anot her one begins.
At t he end of t he Europa-Union Deut schland congress held in
Hamburg at the end of October 1954, the leader of this organisation at the
time underlined: We are not despairing at the failure of the EDC, but we
will not be told that with the WEU we had found a new European solution.
European for us federalists this means that the solution found in Paris
was not ours.
At a meeting in Rome on the 5
th
of December 1954, the Movimento
Federalista Europeo went even further (I quote): The MFE is deter-
mined to act in Italy, within the UEF, to ensure that federalists every-
where become promoters of a particular propaganda. That is to say that
42
t hey should convince t he public t hat our nat ional St at es can no longer
justify their people obeying their laws and their government acts with
regard to foreign, military and economic policies
It was around t hemes such as t hese t hat t he great debat e opened, and
that European federalists became divided on the action to take. This
debate resulted first of all in the split of the Union of European Federalists
in 1956. Their common home could not withstand the test and it took until
the 1970s, with the congress that took place in April 1973 in Brussels, for
the unity to be reformed, spurred on by Etienne Hirsch, friend of Jean
Monnet and former president of Euratom.
On the 9
th
of November 1954, for his part, the inspiring Jean
Monnet , had elsewhere announced t hat at t he end of his office he would
not be standing for presidency of the ECSC High Authority. In his letter
of resignation, that he read publicly, Monnet declared; it is in order to
participate with total freedom of action and of speech to the establishment
of the European Union that I will take this freedom on the 10
th
of
February. In fact, on the 13
th
of October 1955, the inspirer coura-
geously gathered around him the most aptly representative political and
unionist figures from the six countries, in the Action Committee for the
United States of Europe. He said this is in order to ensure that the
resolution of Messina of the 2
nd
of June of t he same year is a new st age
towards the United States of Europe. It was in fact in Messina that the
six foreign affairs ministers decided to pick up where the European
integration had left off on the 30
th
of June 1954 by suggest ing t hat t he new
course should encompass t he whole economy.
From the Messina Relaunch to a European Community: End of the 50s,
Beginning of the 60s
In the face of this up and down turn of events, within the European
Union of Federalists, the most radical tendency, behind Altiero Spinelli,
was that of Alexandre Marc and Michel Mouskhely, eminent professor
of constitutional law at the University of Strasburg. Their theses were
explained in a manifesto published under the title Struggle for the
European people. This team, which was later to bring about the Con-
gress of the European people, included men known for their attachment
to different but profound federalist sources: Hamilton and Proudhon,
to simplify. What united them for some years in the same strategy were
common opinions linked to one analysis of current circumstances. What
was t he unusual subject of t his st rat egy? It was t he European People!
43
What was the role of the federalists to be? It was to become the avant-
garde of these people that the ancien rgime had tried to keep in a limbo.
Condemning verbal Europeanism, the signatories of the manifesto stated
that they wanted to attempt the endeavour of a Congress of the European
People foreshadowing a federal Europe, just like Ghandi s Congress in
India had, for many years, embodied the principal expression of a will for
independence and unit y. The Congress of t he European People would
therefore be a forum to facilitate the development of an effort starting
from t he grassroot s. The delegat es would be elect ed t hrough primary
elections, on the blue print of the primary elections in America. This
congress was to demand, more and more strongly, that the construction
of Europe become a matter for the Europeans themselves, through the
intervention of an elected Constituent Assembly.
Such wat chwords, by t heir ambit ion, could eit her discourage or
seduce: in any case they foresaw a militant mobilisation without prec-
edent in a Europe t hat , it has t o be said, was only possible during periods
of extreme crisis.
Now, the serious crisis begun by the failure of the EDC on the 30
th
of
April 1954 was relatively short-lived. Less than a year after this failure,
t he relaunch decided upon in Messina was t o succeed wit h t he t reat ies of
Rome on the 23
rd
of March 1957, establishing a European Atomic
Energy Community (EURATOM) and a European Economic Com-
munity.
On the 1
st
of January 1958, the treaties of Rome came into effect after
undisturbed parliamentary ratifications. The Commissions of the new
Communit ies set t led in Brussels and Robert Schuman presided over t he
European Parliamentary assembly in Strasburg. The ECSC was no longer
isolated in Luxemburg; the European Community was now a new reality
in new domains. In brief, the course of history and of European integra-
tion, interrupted for a while, gave the impression of having picked up its
natural pace again.
Ironically, it was those federalist circles who had at first been the most
reserved towards this European relaunch, who didn t think their
economic and political intentions were being served by sufficiently
strong institutions, who benefited in their campaigns from the undeniably
favourable psychological and political European climate that surrounded
the signature and the ratification of the Rome treaties.
Many federalists dreamt of adopting this extra political spirit that the
new economic Europe needed thanks to the original and motivating
experience of the European People s Congress. In a number of regions of
44
the Federal German Republic, Belgium, France and Italy, where Altiero
Spinelli had t he largest base, but not forget t ing Aust ria and t he t own of
Geneva, federalist militants organised primary elections inspired by
those that had taken place in the United States. The objective of these
elect ions was t hat of appoint ing delegat es who would const it ut e a
European People s Congress to represent a new democratic legitimacy,
pending the European elections provided for by the community treaties,
but which effectively did not take place until June 1979.
The delegates, armed with cahiers de dolances, expressed t he
reasons why t heir t owns and regions hoped for t he creat ion of a federal
Europe. On the other hand, the congress had to approve a constituent
treaty, and their action could have resulted in the competent authorities
taking it into consideration.
The idea was simple and appealing. It gave rise to extraordinary
devotion, but this was short lived: the primary elections were, in fact, only
successful where a fairly st rong European organisat ion already exist ed.
On the other hand, in order to permanently integrate the real sociological
forces int o t his act ion, much st ronger means would have been necessary.
The first European People s Congress was held in Turin in December
1957. Present were delegates representing seventy thousand voters from
St rasburg, Lyons, Maast richt , Milan, Turin, Ant werp, Geneva and
Dsseldorf. The second Congress session t ook place in Lyons in January
1959. Three hundred and twenty four thousand European voters were
represented. In December of the same year, three hundred and ninety five
t housand vot ers were account ed for at t he Darmst adt Congress in Ger-
many. In Ostende, finally, in June 1960, the delegates spoke in the name
of four hundred and t went y five t housand Europeans. Considerable
success was obt ained in a number of large t owns in It aly, especially, but
also in other countries, in small Austrian, Dutch and French constituen-
cies, where not able percent ages of vot ers were oft en recorded. So, in
Annecy and it s suburbs where t he percent age of vot ers reached 40% of
t he number achieved during t he previous council elect ions, 43% in a
small Normandy town like Vernon, where I was elected on the 23
rd
of
April 1961.
It would therefore be incorrect to assert that this premonitory experi-
ence was negat ive. At least it enabled us t o verify, where it had been
possible, t hat Europe was favourably considered, at a t ime when what
we call the common market was starting to awaken the citizens of
towns and countryside to their common interests. This experience was the
symbol of t he dawning of a new conscience, despit e t he silence and
45
slowness of official circles.
So, the European community did not cease to widen its field of
experience. Along the way, it was also enriched by European movements
and federalist militants. With time the movements were joined by col-
leges, inst it ut es, Universit y st udy and research cent res, European Houses,
specialised associat ions (municipalit ies, educat ors, journalist s and rail-
way workers), training centres, etc..
Nevertheless, up to this point, the Europeans were not able to create
a common political organisation, worthy of that name. Of course, they
were able to hold European elections, certainly not the Constituent
Assembly that their elders had deemed necessary in the 1950s. The
differences bet ween nat ional sovereignt ies persist ed despit e t he common
constraints arising a little more each year, economic interest, social or
monetary realities, and diplomatic constraints.
In any case, it seems to me that an essential lesson has arisen from this
hist orical out line: government s have advanced, progressed, act ed and
reacted only because committed women and men, ideas and movements
have exist ed, act ed and react ed.
This is what I wanted to recall when I recounted the journey from the
Second World War to the beginning of the 1960s, when it became
obvious that the experience of the Community, as a community of
dest iny, int erest s and values, would serve as a framework for a new
democratic development: that of a Federal European People.
Much has already been achieved: t he world of concent rat ion camps
has disappeared, t ot alit arianism has been crushed, t he German people
have been reunited in freedom, and Europe is no longer the theatre of the
dreadful confrontations that bathed it in blood for centuries. The enlarge-
ment of 2004 at last foreshadows the reunification of the old continent as
a whole, while a common currency is circulating in the twelve countries
that today constitute the Eurozone. However, the European Union is
st ill bogged down, and will cont inue t o be so for as long as it s Nat ion
States maintain the exclusivity of some of their royal prerogatives
(foreign policy and defence among others). The federal objective is
therefore constantly evolving. Consequently, the historical mission of the
federalists is more indispensable than ever. But, are they fully aware of
this?
46
NOTES
1
28 June 1919.
2
Trianon (Hungary), 4 June 1920.
3
Saint-Germain (Austria), 10 September 1919.
4
LIde europenne 1918-1965, De Tempel, Tempelhof, Bruges, 1965.
5
Presses de l Universit de Paris-Sorbonn, 2003.
6
Les Pionniers de l Europe communautaire, Centre de recherches europennes de
l universit de Lausanne, 1968. Preface by Henri Rieben.
7
Henri Brugmans, L ide europenne 1918-1965, cit. p.111.
8
European Human Rights Convention including the mechanisms of protection (the
commission, the Court) adopted on 4.11.1950, effective from 3.9.1953.
9
Korean War in July 1950.
10
The project presented by the president of the constitutional commission of the ad hoc
Assembly, the German Heinrich Von Brentano, was adopted unanimously except for one
vote, on the 10
th
of March 1953, and ratified by the assembly.
11
La querelle de la EDC, Armand Collin, Paris, 1956, p. 29.
47
Federalism in the History of Thought
EUROPEAN RESISTANCE
FOR EUROPEAN UNITY
One effect of the passing of the decades, and of the turnover of
generations it brings, is the disappearance of personal historical memory.
We all have access t o hist ory books, and t o t he endless hist orical
reflections and reconstructions that seek to interpret the events of the
recent past , but t here is a world of difference bet ween reading a book and
coming across a slice of history in one s own memory, or in the memory
of someone who actually lived through the relevant period, and is still
alive to recount it in his or her own words. In these cases, historical facts
and event s become experiences t hat , bound up wit h passion, suffering,
hopes and plans, prompt us to reflect upon and to look for solutions to
those problems of the present that derive from failure to find responses
to similar problems in the recent past. But once these experiences,
together with the individuals who embody them, are gone, we run a real
risk formal days of remembrance apart of losing t hat widespread
sense of t he need t o carry t hrough an unfinished t ask, and are t hus in
danger of becoming the victims, and not the masters, of history.
The danger hanging over the citizens of Europe is precisely that of
allowing the years to slip by without managing to find the answer to the
problems that, for almost a full half century, turned Europe into a
bat t lefield, suffocat ed democracy, and favoured t he birt h and spread of
Fascism and Nazism: t he answer t hat a generat ion, now all but gone, was
able, under the impetus of these tragic events, to indicate and to an extent
to pursue, but not to carry through entirely: the European federation.
As demonst rat ed by t he brief t ext s we reproduce below, which were
first published in Lunit europea in September and October 1944 and in
Giovane Europa on April 25 1957, the Resistance movements active in
the various European countries recognised, albeit demonstrating differ-
ent degrees of clear-sightedness, that European federation constituted the
essential and supreme response to totalitarianism and war. Only a few of
48
t hem, however, showed a clear awareness of t he significance of t he
passing of time, that is to say, of the fact that, over time, the flames of
popular passion t hat had been fanned by t he ruins of war and by
oppression could act ually die out , leaving t he sit uat ion t o set back int o t he
old nation-state mould. This fear was certainly not without foundation,
given that most of the members of the Resistance movements belonged
to traditional political currents closely attached to national political
st ruggle, and who had always regarded European unit y as a valid ideal,
but one secondary to the affirmation of the values and specific policies
advanced by the various ideologies at work within the framework of the
nation-state.
The fact that Europe is still divided and that, in the face of the new
world disorder, it is paying t he price of t his division proves that
hist orical opport unit ies must be seized upon as soon as t hey present
themselves, and that failure to seize them can adversely affect the future,
and even render meaningless the aspirations of the past. Whether the
fut ure brings Europe s decline or t he definit ive vanquishing of t he ghost s
of t he past depends on us.
In truth, the work of the Resistance movement cannot be considered
complet e as long as divisive forces cont inue t o be present in Europe, and
as long as the continent continues to allow the nationalist trends that
threaten democracy and peaceful cohabitation to keep on resurfacing. We
need something more than appeals not to forget the past: we need to carry
the project for European unity through to its natural conclusion, by
creating a European federal state.
* * *
Belgium
Banned, like all the other political organisations, by the Nazis in 1940, the
socialist party was the only one of the three major parties to re-form clandestinely.
In 1942 the leaders of this clandestine party, in a manifesto that presented
socialism as the solution to most of the problems of the post-war period, assumed
the following position in relation to international politics (see issue n. 3, dated
March 1944, of the journal Avenir, which was published in Stockholm).
The domination of Belgium by any other country in the future
European community will be refused. It is at the heart of a community of
49
free peoples that Belgium will find the guarantees of peace it aspires to.
Belgium will accept certain restrictions on its sovereignty, as indeed
must all states mindful of their international obligations. But these must
be restrictions imposed through international law applicable to all. This
law will oblige all the states to resolve their disputes through arbitration.
It will prohibit the national re-armament both of the victors and the
vanquished of t he present war. Any st at e t hat , inst ead of accept ing t his
recourse to arbitration, attempts to invade the territory of another state,
must be punished for this by an international police force. National
sovereignt y must also be relinquished in t he int erest s of int ernat ional
economic solidarity. Ending wrangling over tariffs, the statute for world
peace must make provision for a distribution of raw materials, credits and
markets that is proportional with the legitimate interests of each people.
Germany
The following declaration is taken from a memorandum on the general
political situation, and on the conclusions to be drawn from it, written, in Spring
1944, by Carl Goerdeler (a leading figure in the opposition to Hitler and civil
leader of the 20th July 1944 conspiracy), and addressed to the other conspirators.
The memorandum was found after the war and published by Gerard Ritter in his
book, Carl Goerdeler und der deutsche Widerstand.
Unification of the European peoples in a European confederation
seems inevitable. The supreme aim of this confederation must be to
safeguard Europe, for ever, against the threat of a European war. For
Europe, such a war would be suicidal. The t ime has come t o realise t he
ideal of unit y, because concret e int erest s coincide wit h t his ideal. We
would expect t his process t o proceed by st ages: first , a permanent
European economic council should eliminate customs barriers and all
other obstacles to free trade. It should create institutions that, together,
would administer all the means of communication and establish common
economic legislat ion. To t hese must be added, as soon as t his st age is
complete, the following political institutions: a European ministry for
economic affairs, a European ministry for foreign affairs, and a European
army.
The details of these initiatives will be easily agreed. We are open to
all forms of collaboration. And the essential basis of this European
community, because it cannot be created by force, must be the voluntary
membership of Europe s nation-states.
50
The Netherlands
The following passage is taken from an article published in the clandestine
Dutch journal Vrij Nederland (Free Holland).
Last ing peace is, t oday, inconceivable, unless t he st at es relinquish
part of their economic and political sovereignty in favour of a higher
European authority. It is crucial that the European community and not the
nation-state be taken as the starting point for any plan we may have for
the rebuilding of Europe. The achievement of equality of rights must not
mean restoring sovereignty to the defeated state, but instead granting that
state limited influence within a European confederation.
This same journal developed, together with Het Parool (The Word), another
important clandestine journal that appeared in the Netherlands, a joint manifesto
addressed to the Dutch people, from which the following passage is taken:
The Netherlands must aspire to closer association with the other
states of western Europe and must work, in a spirit of loyalty, towards the
creation of a new Society of Nations. The Netherlands must be prepared
t o accept rest rict ions being placed on it s sovereignt y, and t he same must
be required of all the states in the interests of the creation of international
law. Recognising the need for the existence of organs of military power
in order to safeguard this law, the Netherlands must, together with the
other small states, appeal for maintenance of the right balance, in the
international order, between power and law.
Poland
The following passage is part of an article that appeared in the Polish
clandestine journal Libert.
The rebuilding of Europe and world peace will be possible only in
a sort of commonwealth of nations that puts an end not only to armed
conflict and the threat of armed conflict, but also to social and economic
st ruggle. The progressive forces wit hin t he nat ions assailed by Fascism
will not be content to oppose the armed forces of the Axis. They will also
use all the means at their disposal to prevent reactionary elements from
gaining access t o power during t he subsequent period of adjust ment .
The desire for revenge, t oday so right and so underst andable, should
fill us wit h a real t hirst for just ice. Because desire for revenge could easily
51
turn into a desire to dominate other nations, which, were it to manifest
itself in the wake of the collapse of Nazism, would merely mean that Nazi
met hods and ideas had ult imat ely prevailed. We must t hus abandon any
desire for revenge and pursue inst ead t he ideal of just ice. Founding t he
organisation of Europe on collaboration, security and freedom will give
Poland a new start.
France
On the initiative of the Lyon-based Franc-Tireur movement, which pub-
lished a clandestine newspaper and political journal, both widely circulated, the
French Committee for European Federation was formed, which, in June 1944,
issued the following declaration.
With the countries of Europe rising up against Hitler s occupation
and finally being able to glimpse the dawn of liberation, there is emerging
and taking shape, among those who, in all the Resistance movements,
const it ut e t he vanguard in t he fight against Nazism, t he idea of a
democratic organisation of a post-war Europe rid for ever of the brown
plague.
For many months now propaganda promoting the idea of a European
federat ion t ruly able t o guarant ee democracy and peace has been appear-
ing in many of the main clandestine publications of the Resistance
movements in France, Belgium, Holland, Poland, and Norway. And this
idea of a free and federate Europe unites in a common hope and in the
same struggle many German antifascist militants who have managed to
escape t ort ure by t he Gest apo and deat h by firing squad. Finally, in t he
countries that are free, the Movement for European Federation is already
an organised realit y. In England, where it was founded and has been
nurtured in the bosom of the Labour Party, it is organising a vast
campaign of meetings and debates; elsewhere satellite committees have
been created; in Italy, the Italian Committee for European Federation,
established immediately after the fall of Mussolini, embraces numerous
longstanding antifascists, members of the various parties of the new Italy,
who have finally been released from the prisons and from the islands.
In France, militant members of the main currents of the Resistance
movement have set up the French Committee for European Federation,
founded on t he following fundament al ideas:
1. A prosperous, democrat ic and peaceful Europe cannot be rebuilt as
a group of sovereign st at es, divided by polit ical boundaries and cust oms
52
barriers: t his would mean proceeding wit h economic rebuilding in t he
worst possible of condit ions, and would make it impossible t o eradicat e
Fascism and Nazism through the total destruction of their economic and
social root s. In t hese condit ions Europe would be permanent ly beset by
economic rivalries, demographic imbalances, material, social and cul-
t ural decay, chauvinist ic and racist t endencies, and recurrent wars t hat
would inflame the entire world and destroy all human civilisation.
2. Any attempt to promote prosperity, democracy, and peace through
a league of st at es in t he Societ y of Nat ions mould is bound t o fail. A
society of nations would, in reality, be nothing more than an impotent
council of rival sovereign st at es, because it would not have at it s disposal
the independent economic, political and military power it would need in
order t o impose it s decisions. It would become an inst rument serving only
the political hegemony of the strongest states, and thus make new
conflicts inevitable.
3. Europe will be able to evolve in the direction of economic progress,
democracy, and peace only if the nation-states unite in a federation and
entrust a European federal state with the continent s economic and
commercial organisation, with the exclusive right to an army and to
intervene against any attempt to re-instate authoritarian regimes, and
with responsibility for the management of foreign affairs, the administra-
tion of colonial territories not yet ripe for independence, and the creation
of European in addition to national citizenship status. The government of
the federal state will be elected not by the nation-states, but democrati-
cally and directly by their peoples.
4. The European federat ion is not opposed t o t he progressive aspect s
of nations. The national governments will be subordinate to the federal
government only in matters that concern the group of federate states as a
whole. But the national governments, like the organs of regional and local
self-government, retaining their administrative, linguistic and cultural
independence, will, with their own specific laws, exist only insofar as
these laws are compatible with the federal laws.
5. The Movement for European Federation intends to collaborate with
the national movements that are fighting for economic and social justice,
against political oppression, and for the free and peaceful manifestation
of their particular national identity. But whereas democratic, socialist and
communist patriots often believe that these objectives need first to be
achieved separately in each country, after which an international situa-
tion will arise in which all peoples may fraternise, the Movement for
European Federat ion put s people on t heir guard against t his illusion. The
53
correct sequence of objectives is, in fact, the precise opposite. In the
framework of a Europe divided into sovereign states, these national
movements are destined to fail and decline; only in a federate Europe will
it be possible for t hem t o develop in a progressive sense. The European
federation is thus the first objective that democratic, socialist and com-
munist pat riot s should be pursuing.
6. The Movement for European Federation opposes the view of those
who, wit h t he excuse t hat t oday we should be concent rat ing on fight ing
for national liberation, maintain that consideration of these problems
would be bet t er deferred t o a lat er dat e. The t wo t asks need t o be carried
out contemporaneously, otherwise we risk repeating what happened in
1919, i.e., subjecting the European peoples to a reactionary organisation
of Europe. If the Movement for European Federation is not immediately
founded on the resistance and liberation movements, if it fails to emerge
as their main political expression in the revolutionary situation that is
upon us, it will subsequently be infinitely more difficult, if not impossi-
ble, to create a European federation.
7. European federat ion, which is a st age in t he process leading t o a
world federation of peoples, must be the immediate objective of the
democratic, socialist and communist militants of the Resistance. The
French Committee for European Federation calls upon them, individu-
ally or collect ively, t o subscribe t o t he essent ial ideas expressed in it s
manifesto and to organise their support for its action.
Italy
In August 1944, the Movimento Federalista Europeo sent the following open
letter to the French Committee for European Federation.
Having recently learned of the formation of the French Committee
for European Federation, we wish to send you, first and foremost, the
fraternal greetings of the Italian Movement for European Federation.
The part of your declaration that struck us most, and that fully reflects
our own views, was point 5 in which you say: But whereas democrat ic,
socialist and communist patriots often believe that these objectives need
first to be achieved separately in each country, after which an interna-
t ional sit uat ion will arise in which all peoples may frat ernise, t he
Movement for European Federation puts people on their guard against
this illusion. The correct sequence of objectives is, in fact, the precise
opposite. The European federation is the first objective that democratic,
54
socialist and communist pat riot s should be pursuing.
We expressed the same view, in our manifesto of August 1941, in
which we wrote: The dividing line between progressive and reactionary
parties no longer coincides with the formal line between more or less
democracy, more or less socialism, but instead with the completely new
and subst ant ial line t hat separat es t hose for whom t he essent ial object ive
of t he st ruggle is t he same as it has always been, i.e., t he winning of
national political power and who, albeit unconsciously, will play t he
old reactionary power game, allowing the incandescent lava of popular
passions to solidify in the old mould, and all the irrationalities of the past
to surface once more and those who believe that the main task is to
create a solid international state, who will channel popular forces in this
direct ion and, even when nat ional power has been won, who will use it
primarily as an instrument for realising international unity.
European federalism has abandoned t he realm of Ut opian ideas and
can st art put t ing down root s, because t oday t here is fert ile ground ready
to receive and nourish them. This ground is the European peoples
resistance to Nazism. It is thanks to the Resistance movements that the
solidarity among the free peoples of our continent has finally come out
into the open: until today, diplomatic intrigues, foreign policies of
alliance, and the balance of powers kept it hidden. It has emerged that
Europe has a single dest iny, and t hus t hat freedom, peace and progress are
assets to be enjoyed, or lost, by all the peoples of Europe together. It is
precisely because Europe st ood back and wat ched, wit h indifference, and
sometimes amusement, the death throes of freedom in Italy, Germany,
Spain, and Czechoslovakia, that freedom has now been lost in almost all
its countries. Today, all these Frenchmen, Yugoslavians, Norwegians,
Poles and others, as well as the Italians who were the last to join the
Resist ance, but whose best were among t he first t o ent er t he fight against
totalitarianism, and the Germans who have died, who languish in prison,
or who faced Himmler s Gestapo in silence and obscurity, practically
st ripped of hope, know t hat t hey have shared in t he same st ruggles,
defeat s and vict ories. This awareness, height ened by t he sacrifice of
millions of men, constitutes the fundamental, primordial basis of a free
Europe.
How, once victory is won, are we to prevent this awareness from
fading rapidly, and each people from once more becoming isolated within
traditional national confines?
Observing the political developments emerging in the individual
countries, we have to acknowledge that the characteristic traits of the
55
various polit ical part ies, despit e becoming less dist inct over t hese years
of struggle for freedom, still exist in the form of a sort of force of inertia
of the spirit. Militant politics has been left trailing behind the real political
problems and t ends t o unit e individuals and social forces mainly, if not
exclusively, on the basis of each individual country s internal political
problems, in other words, in a manner that cannot fail to have disastrous
consequences.
Alt hough t he peoples have a sensat ion of European solidarit y, t hey
have yet to identify the path to follow in order to create it. They cannot
be blamed for this, as there has never existed an international institution
with the capacity to instil in them this new political vision. So, while the
peoples were being subject ed t o foolish nat ionalist ic propaganda, and
international relations entrusted exclusively to professional diplomats,
the parties, whose role is to unify the masses, chose to give priority to the
most popular problems, to the detriment of those that are the most
important. And it is from this that the federalist task arises. We cannot
t oday dream of founding a federalist part y, because a federalist part y
would have no hope of attracting sufficient popular support, together with
an appreciation that Europe s problems are effectively more pressing
than national problems. A party, or organisation, whose purpose is
democratically to win political power within a state presupposes the
existence of the latter. As long as there exists no federal state and, as a
result, no federal democratic political struggle, there can be no federal
party. Today, parties can only be national: this much is demonstrated by
the experiences of the socialists and communists, who have, in the course
of their histories, repeatedly attempted to form international parties, only
being obliged ultimately to revert to national level.
To overcome these difficulties, we must seek to get round them. All
parties make domestic politics their primary concern, but upon coming to
power have to be equipped to resolve international difficulties. We must
make it clear to all parties, and all movements, that they will not be able
to achieve their ends democracy, socialism, freedom, national inde-
pendence unless they have, and follow, a clear foreign policy. This
work, which we have attempted in Italy, has given promising results. If
it can be continued elsewhere, and, most importantly, if it can be
developed successfully in France, it could prove t o be of crucial impor-
t ance, as t he voice of France would doubt less command great er respect
among the leading world powers than that of any other country.
The old bases of European foreign policy have, in fact, been de-
stroyed, as have all the states political, military and economic appara-
56
t uses. We find ourselves faced wit h a new sit uat ion, in which t he
progressive parties, now free from the old resistance they previously met
in what is now a shaky diplomatic system, can, providing they are suffi-
ciently convinced of the need for a European federation, actually achieve
what, in the past, was little more than a Utopian dream.
Of course, the peoples of Europe will not be alone in deciding their
fate. The entire world has felt the heat of the flames that have raged about
us, and given that the world s most influential countries have helped to
put them out, they will have every right to demand that Europe stop being
the powder-keg of mankind. The European peoples cannot refuse this
intervention, nor is it right that they should wish to, given that, from all
points of view, they are so much in need of it. Nevertheless, having first
taken immediate steps to ensure the complete destruction of Nazism and
fascism, they must call upon all the continent s countries, first the free
nations and then the defeated ones, to help in the task of rebuilding Europe
on democratic foundations. Despite appearances to the contrary, the
long-term fate of Europe and of European civilisation will always rest in
t he hands of t he Europeans.
If the people of Europe really wanted to create a free community of
European nations, rid of every last seed of imperialism and of militarism,
and knew how to go about achieving it, then the major world powers
would not have serious grounds for opposing t hem, and would not be able
to oppose them even if they wanted to.
If, on the other hand, the countries of Europe showed themselves to
be divided and incapable of prevailing over the political anarchy that for
too long has reigned in this part of the world, it would be natural for the
world s leading powers to revert to the old policy of balances, alliances
and spheres of influence, in an attempt to neutralise the dangers that
would cont inue t o hang over our cont inent .
Given that no coherent European federalist policy can be imple-
mented without first forming a movement that goes beyond national
boundaries (rather in the way the party framework needs to be overcome
within the individual countries), the Italian federalist movement has
taken an active role in the formation and work of the Federalist European
Centre.
Declaration of the European Resistance Movements
Several members of the national Resistance movements in Denmark,
France, Italy, Norway, The Netherlands, Poland, Czechoslovakia and
57
Yugoslavia, together with representatives of a group of anti-Nazi Resist-
ance fighters in Germany, met in Geneva on March 31st, April 29th, May
20th and July 7th, 1944, to draw up a draft declaration, here reproduced
in part , which was subsequent ly debat ed by and submit t ed for t he
approval of all the European Resistance movements.
I
Resistance of Nazi oppression, uniting all the peoples of Europe in
a common struggle, has created among them a solidarity and community
of purpose and of int erest s whose full scope and significance became
apparent when delegates of the European Resistance movements met to
draw up t his declarat ion, in which t hey set out t heir hopes and int ent ions
for the future of civilisation and peace.
The free men who today make up the Resistance movement know that
the battle tirelessly fought at national level, notwithstanding the regime
of terror, against the enemy s machine of war represents a positive
contribution, important to the battle fought by the United Nations, that
justifies the right of the respective countries to participate in the building
of peace and the reconstruction of Europe on equal terms with the
countries that emerged victorious from the conflict.
By subscribing to the essential declarations of the Atlantic Charter,
they affirm that the life of the peoples they represent must be founded on
respect for the individual, security, social justice, the exploitation of
economic resources exclusively to the good of the collective whole, and
the independent development of national life.
II
These object ives can be achieved only if t he world s count ries accept
t he need t o supersede t he doct rine of t he absolut e sovereignt y of st at es,
joining together in a single federal organisation.
The persistent lack of unity and cohesion in different parts of the
world renders impossible the immediate creation of an organisation that
unit es all civilisat ions under a single federal government .
[...]
III
Peace in Europe is the keystone of world peace. Indeed, in the space
of a single generation, Europe has been the epicentre of two world
conflicts that have stemmed, above all, from the existence, in this
continent, of 30 sovereign states. The priority must be to put an end to this
58
anarchy through the creation of a federal union of European peoples.
Only a federal union can provide an answer t o t he boundary problems
that afflict areas inhabited by members of different peoples, which, no
longer the focus of insane acts of nationalistic cupidity, will instead
become simple purely administrative matters of territorial division.
Only a federal union can safeguard t he democrat ic inst it ut ions and so
prevent politically immature countries from jeopardising the general
order.
Only in a federal union will it be possible to rebuild the continent s
economy and suppress nat ional monopolies and anarchy.
Only a federal union can provide a logical and natural solution to the
problems of maritime access for the continent s internal areas, the
rational use of rivers that flow through different states, and the control of
straits and, more generally, to most of the problems that have made
international relations difficult in recent decades.
IV
It is too early to sketch out the geographical boundaries of a federal
union able to guarantee peace in Europe. But it is worth pointing out that
it will have to be, from the outset, very strong and large enough not to run
the risk of becoming the zone of influence of some foreign state or an
instrument of the political hegemony of one of the member states.
Furthermore, the union must, from the outset, be open to any country
located entirely or partially in Europe, that can and wants to become a
member of it.
The federal union must be founded on a declaration of civil, political
and economic rights, which will guarantee the free development of the
human personality and the normal functioning of the democratic institu-
tions; furthermore, it must endorse a declaration of the right of minority
groups to autonomous existence, providing this autonomy is compatible
with the integrity of the nation-states of which they are part.
The federal union must not seek to undermine the right of each
member state to resolve its own specific difficulties in a manner that
conforms with its peculiar ethnic and cultural traits. But, in view of the
experiences and failures of the Society of Nations, the states must
irrevocably transfer to the federation their sovereign powers relating to
the defence of its territory, their relations with foreign powers, and
international trade and communications.
The federal union must possess essent ially:
1) A government answerable not to the governments of the various
59
member states, but to their people, over which this government must,
within the scope of its powers, exercise direct jurisdiction.
2) An army commanded by this government, which precludes the
existence of any national army.
3) A supreme court that will settle questions relating to interpretation
of t he federal const it ut ion as well as possible disput es bet ween member
st at es, and bet ween t he st at es and t he federat ion.
[...]
VI
The undersigned Resist ance movement s acknowledge t he need for
the United Nations to play an active role in solving the European problem,
but ask t hat all measures int roduced bet ween t he ending of host ilit ies and
the establishment of peace reflect the requirements of a federal organisa-
tion.
They call upon all the world s spiritual and political forces, and in
particular those of the United Nations, to assist them in their efforts to
achieve the objectives set out in this declaration.
They undertake to view their national problems as specific aspects of
the whole European problem and undertake to set up, as from now, a
permanent office which will be responsible for coordinating efforts to
liberat e t heir count ries, t o organise t he federal union of European
peoples, and t o est ablish peace and just ice in t he world.
(prefaced and edited by Nicoletta Mosconi)